Waitangi — our national day is worth celebrating, not something to be slightly ashamed of

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The Treaty of Waitangi is not some abstract notion of little importance to anyone. It is New Zealand’s founding constitutional document, and it affects our lives in various real ways, legally and by the manner in which we conduct our public affairs. Waitangi Day is our country’s national day and it is a day worth celebrating, not something to be slightly ashamed of.

Wellingtonians have the opportunity to mark today by checking out the actual Treaty document. Yes, the very one signed on this day in 1840 by Captain William Hobson, RN and the assembled chiefs of the northern tribes at Waitangi. Not many people seem to know that the Treaty is on permanent display in the Constitution Room at Archives NZ in Mulgrave St, Wellington, opposite Aitken St. Archives is open today from 10am to 4pm specially for people to look at the Treaty. Go there.

The Treaty was a product of both missionary and official British desire to ensure Maori were treated substantially better than indigenous Australians were when formal British occupation of their country began 52 years before Waitangi. Though settler honouring of the Treaty only lasted until their demands for land exceeded iwi willingness to sell, much that happened in New Zealand was still far and away better than what happened in Australia, as I wrote in my December article on new Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd’s intention finally to say “sorry” to the Aborigines for the shameful way they were treated for the best part of 200 years.

Despite the land grabs that took place here and the suppression of much of Maori culture until about 1970, many good things happened too, especially in comparison with Australia and many other colonised countries, and more has been done to make amends in the past three decades than probably anywhere else.

In 1869, a full 100 years before Australian Aborigines were allowed to vote, the colonial New Zealand Parliament extended the franchise to all Maori men, at a time many settler men remained excluded. Maori had to vote in the four special seats created for them, but the fact they were allowed to vote was an important and enlightened development for the time, 24 years before our pioneering enfranchisement of women. New Zealand never had laws overtly discriminating against Maori or preventing them from taking part in civil and political life. Intermarriage has been common and accepted here since Europeans started arriving, to the extent that most people of Maori ancestry now also have European ancestry. There has always been a general goodwill between the races here, even during times of strain and controversy. Since 1970 there has been a remarkable renaissance of Maori culture, language and participation in the political process. The creation of the Waitangi Tribunal in 1975 led to the continuing, honorable, bipartisan settling of land and other grievances dating back to colonial times, a process Australia has barely begun. Not everyone has been happy with the settlement process. Many Pakeha were at the beginning suspicious and opposed, though that has now much waned. Many Maori still feel it is taking too long. But it is nonetheless taking place.

These are things to reflect on, to celebrate and be proud of today, 168 years after the signing of the Treaty. As John Clarke used to sing in his Fred Dagg days, sometimes we don’t know how lucky we are.

Other Waitangi blogging: Stef the Ex-expat has a thoughtful Waitangi Day essay on Pakeha learning te reo. David Farrar says Helen Clark blundered by staying away from Te Tii Marae, while John Key looked prime ministerial. David makes the hilarious point that only in New Zealand could one see the spectacle of someone like John Key “shaking hands with Tame Iti, who was arrested by the police for allegedly being the leader of a group which aimed, amongst other things, to assassinate [him].” Not PC has an interesting, black-letter-law, Eurocentrist view of the Treaty, which, probably deliberately, misses the point that times change. Chris Bourke delves back into his Truth archives to affirm why we need Waitangi Day, including rediscovering the racist Pukekohe barber shop and cinema mentioned in this article.

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Filed under New Zealand, Race relations

Tags: Treaty of Waitangi, Waitangi Day