[1] The United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was discussed at
every hui
held by Matike Mai o Aotearoa
(the Independent Working Group on Constitutional Transformation) and was
referred to in most of the written submissions received. Although the Crown has attempted to
downplay its importance (after initially declining to recognise it at all) it
continues to have growing resonance.
Because a number of Māori contributed to
the drafting of the Declaration, many of our people understand its relevance
here as well as overseas. It is perhaps
the most well-known of all international human rights’ instruments, and those
involved in its drafting were often referred to.
The
respected kuia Erihapeti
Murchie was one of those who was actively involved in the early drafting
stages. At a crucial point in the
process in 1992 she stated –
“As Ngāi Tahu and as a
Māori I see the Declaration as an international expression of the rights we
have through whakapapa
and the
treaty.
"As an indigenous woman I see
it as the first ever international statement about the minimum human rights standards
that apply to Indigenous Peoples, including indigenous women and children. From both points of the view the Declaration
will enable us to claim back the right of self-determination and give our
people international reassurance that tino rangatiratanga has a political as
well as a cultural meaning.”
For several
years one of the rangatira
who accompanied the Māori delegation to drafting sessions of the Declaration
was Sir Archie Taiaroa. He also saw the links between the Declaration
and Te
Tiriti as well as its particular relevance to the constitutional
change hui which were being held at Hīrangi during the 1990s
“I am reminded of the
times when our
old people travelled to London and even to what was then called the League of Nations in
Geneva to get pressure put
on the Crown to honour the treaty.
"Well
we are back here now but in different circumstances, and this time we are
drafting something, this Declaration, which is unique because it involves so
many Indigenous Peoples. It’s also
unique because it seems to have so much in common with Te Tiriti.
"It seems that at last the work of all those
people who travelled to Europe might be bearing fruit. If it does, then the Declaration could sit
alongside the treaty and maybe the discussions at Hīrangi might lead to further
kōrero in the future.”
Matike Mai
similarly saw the Declaration as an international expression of what tino rangatiratanga
means in political and constitution terms, and they agreed with the view of the
Native American jurist John
Mohawk –
“The efforts by
hundreds of Indigenous Peoples to draft the UN Declaration is another attempt
to express in human rights law the basic tenets of being indigenous – a love
for and authority with the land, a resolve to enhance and protect the right to
be the people of the land, the power to have sovereignty and to be
self-determining, and the ancestral obligation to find a good way of relating
with others …
"Because of our history it also means helping us recover from centuries of dispossession by
stating to the world who we are and what we are entitled to … by declaring the
human rights, the humanity, that colonisation has for too long denied us.”
We will
consider the UN Declaration further next week.
[1] Nineteenth
edited extract from pp. 60 – 61 of He Whakaaro
Here Whakaumu Mō Aotearoa – The Report of Matike Mai o Aotearoa
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