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Maori reject compromise

Maori tribes angrily rejected a government proposal to make the country's 18,700km coastline public property yesterday, and called for a mass march on parliament to protest the move.

Maori, who won a court case on the issue, say their forebears owned the foreshore and seabed before European settlers arrived 163 years ago, and it remains their property.

They said the proposal means the property will be placed in government ownership.

"This is the last land grab they can get their hands on," veteran Maori protester and Maori Council member Titewhai Harawera told National Radio.

"I'm sick and tired of the government trying to legislate to give itself ownership. That ownership belongs with Maori, end of story," she said, calling for a protest march, known as a hikoi, on parliament.

Federation of Maori Authorities executive deputy chairman Paul Morgan said Maori had been stripped of their property for 163 years.

"They are going to change the law to appease 85 percent of the community," he said of the plan, widely seen as protecting the coastline and sea access rights of the majority ethnic European community.

Indigenous Maori total 540,000 of New Zealand's 4 million people. They are among the nation's poorest citizens, with low education and income levels, poor health and housing standards, and high numbers of unemployed.

Maori say they want to establish and run coastal aquaculture ventures like mussel and oyster farms, but that they have been shut out of coastal space by other operators and local regulators.

Not all Maori were angry. Gloria Herbert, chairwoman of the Te Runanga o Te Rarawa tribal council, said she saw a "hopeful sign" in the government saying it did not want legal title to the foreshore and seabed.

If no one owned the foreshore, then management and control became the key issues and Maori should be involved in both, she said.

The Labor-led government's Maori legislators support the proposal but warned that Maori interests are "always compromised in the so-called public interest."

Associate Maori Affairs Minister John Tamihere said Maori traditionally had usage rights and the right to pass those on intact, "not to trade it, not to put a commercial value on it and not to talk about money."

New Zealand's longest-serving Labor Maori lawmaker, Dover Samuels, a junior Cabinet minister, supported the proposal. "I think they are visionary and forward looking, rather than arguing about who was here first," he said.

Right-wing political parties want all coastal areas put in government ownership while United Future, a key supporter of the ruling coalition, has not yet committed to supporting the bill.
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