PITFALLS AND PIPELINES

In the pending clash over large-scale prospecting, mining and drilling of their whenua, certain hallmark behaviours will be seen amongst some Iwi leaders which will give an accurate indication to their people of how far inside the belly of the beast they have crawled.  For Hapū mana whenua who have to deal with any Iwi-level sellout to the mining industry, there are lessons to be learned from the experiences of other indigenous peoples.

The comprehensive 2009 report Pitfalls and Pipelines – Indigenous Peoples and Extractive Industries notes that one of the main problems of mining for indigenous peoples is social division amongst themselves over land ownership, current livelihoods, intergenerational or gender-based conflicts, and contesting leadership claims between traditional and ‘elected’ leaders regarding their ‘free prior and informed consent’ (FPIC).

Often these divisions are based on already existing tensions, but the arrival of prospecting and mining increases them.  Companies can then deliberately exploit the divisions to claim they have FPIC from willing Iwi with whom they make deals, while excluding other Iwi and Hapū who refuse to do a deal.

One of the most illustrative examples of this kind of behaviour concerns the Subanon people of the Zamboanga Peninsula in the Phillipines. 

In 1994 the Canadian company TVI Pacific Inc arrived to mine Mount Canatuan, the Subanon’s sacred mountain.  After their traditional leadership refused TVI entry, a new type of leadership called a ‘Council of Elders’ was imposed on them at the behest of the company.  This Council made a show of exploring the pros and cons of mining, then gave TVI entry. 

Over the next thirteen years the Subanon did everything in their power to protect their land, including legal action.  But all their efforts came to nothing as TVI claimed it had their consent.  Additionally the Phillipines government, a major investor in the mine, allowed the company to damage Subanon personal property and to physically intimidate and attack Subanon traditional leaders.

Finally, in 2007 the Subanon turned to their own traditional judicial authority, Gukom sog Pito ko Dolungan, for a ruling.  After long deliberations, the Gukom ruled in 2009 that TVI Pacific had violated human rights and Subanon customary law, and it ordered the company to take part in a mandatory cleansing ceremony and pay fines to the Subanon for their actions. 

It took a further two years before the company finally accepted the ruling, recognised the traditional leadership, took part in the cleansing ceremony, acknowledged the desecration of the Subanon’s sacred mountain, admitted to other misdeeds, and paid the fines. 

Although largely symbolic (TVI has still not closed the Canatuan mine), the good news is that this victory shows Hapū that they too can overcome the huge power imbalances between themselves, exploitative companies, compliant Iwi, and complicit governments. 

However, if their Iwi opt for pipelines of mining company cash, Hapū will first have to deal with the resultant social division. And that’s just one of the pitfalls of large-scale mining they will face.

THE SILENT MAJORITY

The Crown has a long and dishonourable history of minimising and neutralising the rights of minorities in this country by imposing norms which silence even the majority.  For example, prior to the 1984 elections, the Labour Party promised to honour the Treaty and settle Treaty grievances.  But when they became the government, they created a process in which Māori had to accept the demands of multiculturalism and “the public good.”  

The concept of multiculturalism is harmless enough as a descriptive term for communities where a number of different cultures live.  But used by the Crown as a normative term, multiculturalism became a way to neutralise Māori demands and minimise the redress of their rights.   

For example, when Moana Jackson released his 1988 report on Māori and the criminal justice system, which critiqued both the system's basis in a monocultural philosophy and the outcome of criminal convictions for Māori within that system way over and above that of non-Māori, Jackson concluded that parallel legal systems for Māori and non- Māori in Aotearoa were mandated by the Treaty.  But under the normative banner of “multiculturalism” then Minister of Justice Geoffrey Palmer, rejected the idea of parallel legal systems out of hand. 

While Jackson's report was quickly sidelined and repressed by the Crown, his analysis still resonates powerfully, and the justice system still remains a source of great misery for Māori to this day.

Another example was the establishment of the Waitangi Tribunal in 1975.  Since 1978, the Tribunal has written a number of reports, but no effect has been given to the vast bulk of the recommendations contained in those reports.  Instead the Crown has largely ignored the reports’ findings and opted to directly negotiate settlements.  The results to date have been a triumph for normative multiculturalism and ongoing misery for Māori.

Now we see similar normative tactics being used to neutralise and minimise other minorities and their rights, but with the added twist of secret lawmaking which bypassed the select committee process and censored much of the official advice that informed that lawmaking. 

Under the New Zealand Public Health and Disability Amendment Bill the carers of disabled adult family members can now be paid; but only if they accept that they can never take legal action against Government for being discriminated against, that spouses and parents aren’t covered, and that payment will only be made if the disabled person is assessed as having high or very high needs.  Similarly, calls to address the high level of childhood poverty in this country have produced the Education Amendment (Breakfast and Lunch Programmes in Schools) Bill.  It does nothing to address the causes of childhood poverty, but it will further stigmatise decile one and two schools.

It is clear that minorities in this country are at the mercy of a Crown which thinks nothing of short-circuiting its own lawmaking processes.  Of course, none of this would be possible without the silent majority.