April 04, 2023
Tamihere discovers colonial angst
Māori Party president and former lawyer John Tamihere says the so-called doctrine of discovery lives on as a way to suppress Indigenous peoples.
The Vatican this week formally repudiated the idea that European colonising powers can take the land and property of non-christian peoples in Africa and the Americas, which was something popes in the 1400s said could happen but which was then rescinded by Pope Paul III in 1535.
Mr Tamihere says the core idea lived on, with European colonisers refusing to recognise Indigenous systems of land title or political organisation.
“This whole doctrine raises under one ugly little concept called ‘I have discovered you and therefore I own you and I own all your land.’ That’s just not true and we all know that,” he says.
Mr Tamihere says not just the Catholic Church but all churches became part of the colonising process, exploiting the natural wairuatanga or spirituality of Indigenous peoples.