BY JOAN SHIELDS
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand - Fifteen participants in a 79- day land occupation earlier this year at Moutoa Gardens in Wanganui took part in a public meeting here August 29.
Some 120 people attended the meeting, which was addressed by three leaders of the occupation - Niko Tangaroa, Tariana Turia, and Ken Mair.
Members of the Whanganui River Maori tribes and their supporters occupied Moutoa Gardens February 28 to press their demand for the return of the two-and-a-half -acre public park area near the center of Wanganui. The land protesters erected tents and buildings, built a wooden fence, and renamed the site Pakaitore, the area's Maori name.
Turia described how 86,000 acres of land had been stolen from Whanganui River tribes by the New Zealand Company and the colonial-settler government last century. "We have been in litigation for 118 years" trying to get the land returned, she said.
The land occupation at Moutoa Gardens dominated politics in New Zealand for months and inspired Maori occupations and protests in other centers. Turia told the meeting that during the three months of the occupation more than 30,000 people from around the country visited Pakaitore and the protesters received NZ$74,000 (US$48,000) in donations.
Over the course of the occupation, she said, they gained a better understanding of the role of the police, whose actions were provocative and racist.
Turia described two incidents that reflected these attitudes. The first was a bomb scare. Six policemen with torches turned up at midnight to search the site for a bomb. Some weeks later, she said, 80 police in full riot gear, backed by the armed offenders squad, turned up at 5:30a.m. to investigate some allegedly stolen building materials. "That shows their concern for human life," she commented.
Mair described the decision to end the land occupation May 18. "We were surrounded by 1,000 cops looking for a scrap," he explained. "We realized the state had come to the point that they wanted us off." The protesters decided to leave "with dignity and discipline."
Describing his own views, Mair said he wanted to see a society where there was "respect for each other, for the collective, and for the natural environment."
"This country has been taken over by a small group of madmen - capitalists," he commented. "I want a society where everyone can fit in, has a say, and is accountable."
Joan Shields is a member of the Meat Workers Union at Alliance Sockburn in Christchurch.