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December 23, 2016
Vigilance needed to protect treaty gains
Waatea Team
Posted On December 23, 2016
A warning that Maori need to be vigilant to protect the gains of the treaty settlement process.
It comes from the chief executive of fisheries settlement trust Te Ohu Kaimoana, which is gearing up for fights on the proposed Kermadec ocean sanctuary and on changes to the Fisheries Act.
Dion Tuuta says officials and politicians are coming up with initiatives and high level policy changes which would roll back rights recognised in the fisheries settlement.
He says anyone involved in Treaty of Waitangi settlements needs to remember that governments forget.
"Twenty odd years after signing the Treaty (of Waitangi), governments forgot the promises the treaty contained. If you look at the Kermadecs, the same sort of thing applies. And I think it has the potential to happen too at the iwi level with individual iwi settlements. Maori and iwi need to be vigilant the crown doesn't forget to maintainand honour those obligations," he says.
Mr Tuuta hopes the election of Bill English as prime minister could make resolution of the Kermadec ocean sanctuary issue easier.
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