mal3ficent

Yesterday morning the NZ Police used the Suppression of Terrorism Act to conduct several dawn raids across the country.
Places in Auckland, Whakatane, Wellington, Ruatoki, Hamilton, Christchurch and Palmerston North were all raided and several arrests were made.
You can read more about it on Indymedia or if you only like your media mainstream, the NZ Herald.

Most of those arrested have name suppression, except well known Tuhoe activist Tame Iti and Aucklander Jamie Lockett.

Here is a really brief history of the Tuhoe struggle.
In 1866, the Tuhoe iwi were grieving after the confiscation of ancestral lands at Waimana and Ruatoki. These lands were taken as part of general confiscations, I'm not really sure exactly why it was done. Some kind of government retaliation after the Land Wars, no doubt.

In 1906, an activist and self-styled prophet, Rua Kenana came to the attention of the government. He dreamed of building a good life for his people, with his visions guided by God, he set about doing so. This often brought him into conflict with the local government and authorities. He built a community at Maungapohatu deep in the Urewera ranges. He tried to stop drinking amongst his iwi, so he started brewing his own alcohol in a bid to keep his people at home. The authorities used this to charge him with sly grogging.
He claimed that King Edward would give up his dominion over Aotearoa, and give his kingship to Rua.
When World War One broke out he opposed conscription of Maori and made pro-Kaiser comments. This was used as grounds to arrest him for sedition.
He must be made an example of, the authorities had to discourage other Maori activists.

On 2 April 1916 a police force invaded Maungapohatu and arrested Rua Kenana for sedition. Rua resisted arrest and there are differing versions on what actually took place.  He was eventually put on trial for the sedition charges, which lasted 47 days. He was not found guilty of sedition, but of resisting arrest and imprisoned for nine months. This trial bankrupted his community and they had to sell off stock and land to meet these costs. They were also made to pay the cost of the police operation. These monetary fines and the time spent in prison  stalled Rua's practical visions of emancipation for his people although it did not impinge his mana. He is well-remembered today.

So why the quick history lesson? Well the penny dropped last night after listening to an interview with Annette Sykes. She likened the raids to the invasions last century, and if you read the NZ Herald article reporting on her Radio NZ interview, you'll see where she draws the similarities.

Tame Iti, while not a prophet, is an activist and an artist. His protesting style is heavily symbolic and he has run into trouble with authorities before. I cannot say whether I know of any 'para-military' style camps going on in the Ruatoki Valley or in the Urewera, simply because I don't know. Do I think Tame and his people are a danger to the New Zealand public? No. I haven't read anything except police claims and a couple of Bomber quotes that allude to something "very serious" going on. I really dislike all the cloak and dagger crap, the 'innuendo till proven guilty' that means a lot of good people end up being demonised by police and media. Right now, I'm more afraid of the police than anyone else. John Minto likened yesterdays events to a scene from Star Wars.

Rua Kenana's story reads like a blueprint for what is going on today.  It is the tried and true method for intimidating anyone who could be seen to be anti-establishment. Tame Iti and the Tuhoe, like Rua and their ancestors, want to be able to govern their own lands, something the New Zealand government has never been able to tolerate. So why do the authorities act now? Well very recently the United Nations voted in the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This declaration lends more international clout to sovereignty movements such as Tino Rangatiratanga and Mana Motuhake.
This article in Indymedia fleshes out the details better than my regurgitated facts. The Government has chosen to crack down on these movements, and anyone mildly sympathetic to them (i.e left-leaning and/or anarchist activists, all of whom acknowledge and support Tino Rangatiratanga) before they could really be legally recognised or get any stronger. The Tuhoe have a claim before the Tribunal right now, so why not cut out the heart of Tuhoe resistance by painting him as today's bogeyman - a terrorist??
It wouldn't be the first time something similar has happened.

Will the terrorism charges stick? Probably not. Will paying the legal fees and battling in court take it's toll on the various sovereignty, peace and environmental movements? I'd say so. That's is probably the whole reason for this tax-payer funded fiasco.

I was quite distressed last night when I watched the actual footage of 128 - a well-known community centre in Te Aro - being raided. Windows being broken - how much is that going to cost to fix? These organisations run on a pittance. Quite often activists work full-time or seasonal jobs and divide their time between work, raising a family and going to meetings. How they would find the time to attend military-style training camps is beyond me.  Most activists I've met are intelligent, capable people who are dedicated to a life of non-violence. Some of them do run Non-Violent Direct Action camps, there's some advertised on the Save Happy Valley website.

People might be wondering why these specific groups have been targeted. Someone more enlightened than I pointed it out yesterday - all of these lefty groups are a threat, in one way or another, to big business. That is a common thread running through all of these movements, they are anti-capitalist and anti-colonialist. The cops claim to have been investigating these groups for the last two years.
There was a media story earlier this year about Thompson & Clark placing corporate spies in the Save Happy Valley organisation, and the Wellington Animal Rights Network / Peace Action Wellington, all of which have been targeted in these raids.

We are still living in a colonial society. The raids of October 15 2007 underscore that for me.

So where to now? Well, there are several protests and meetings being planned in places around New Zealand.
Indymedia.org.nz is probably the best source for finding out where one near you is taking place.
If you feel that strongly about it, get involved! There's always room for new volunteers, donations, writing letters to your MP and demanding an explanation for this waste of taxpayer money, complaints about police behaviour in holding up school buses and that sort of thing.

I'm going to end this post by expressing my aroha and kotahitanga for all of those affected by yesterdays raids.

In Love & Solidarity.