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Friday, March 09, 2007

Land review chance to fix mistakes

The Prime Minister says a review of all the government's land holdings will be a chance to correct some mistakes which may have been made 20 years ago.

State-owned Enterprises Minister Trevor Mallard today announced the review of Landcorp's process for selling surplus land had been widened to include all crown land.

Helen Clark says state owned enterprises were set up in 1987, the Crown's landholdings were divided between the new SOEs and departments like Conservation, Health and Education.

She says it's important the review be as wide as possible.

“This is a chance to see what slipped through the cracks in 1987. I don’t remember DoC at the time particularly drawing my attention to properties that were going to Landcorp, but I do recall some battles over the Forest Service land allocation, and certainly as minister of conservation I didn’t get everything I wanted at that time,” Ms Clark says.

The review will be led by the Prime Minister's Department, with input from Treasury, Land Information New Zealand and Te Puni Kokiri.

HEKE KORORAREKA CELEBRATION OVERDUE

A Maori historian says this weekend's commemoration of Hone Heke's sacking of Kororareka is long overdue.

There will be a service at Maiki Hill in Russell at dawn on Sunday to mark the day in 1845 when northern chiefs Hone Heke and Te Ruki Kawiti united to force the town's inhabitants to evacuate.

The incident sparked a naval bombardment in retaliation, and was the start of what's known as the War in the North, which ended with the battles of Ohaewai and Ruapekapeka later that year.

Rawiri Taonui from Canterbury University says Heke had run out of patience after three years of unsuccessfully petitioning Governor Fitzroy about what he saw as breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi.

“It's a significant day for Maori because it’s really the first in a long series of vents, including the land wars, Parihaka, coming right up through Bastion Point, the Raglan occupation, and the great hikoi and the struggle over the foreshore and seabed. It’s the first emancipatory act on the part of Maori,” Mr Taonui says.

MANA ARIKI COMPETITIONS

One of the biggest events in the Maori cultural calendar happens this weekend at a little known marae in the King Country.

More than 50 teams are expected at Mana Ariki marae at Okahukura for the 25th annual kapa haka festival.

Marae chair David Pennan the complex, which is the headquarters of the Kotahitanga Church Building Society, is set up for catering to the kinds of crowds expected, which range from kohanga reo groups to seniors.

“We've got a huge marae here. One of our buildings can sleep up to 1200 people and cater for 2000. We probably have a good half a dozen buildings we’re sleeping them all in. It’s a huge marae, Mana Ariki,it’s probably the biggest marae in New Zealand,” Mr Pennan says.

SPRINGBOK TOUR MAKES ARTWORK

The sights and sounds of the 1981 Springbok rugby tour have been brought back for an exhibition which was opened by the Prime Minister today.

Restless, at the new Moving Image Centre on Auckland's Karangahape Road, includes works by a number of Maori and Pafcific artists working in film, video and other electronic media.

It includes a 26-minute work by photographer John Miller from Ngapuhi, based on 315 colour slides he took of tour protests and tape recordings from the time.

Miller says wanted to remind participants what they went through 26 years ago, and also give young people a sense of what the country was like.

“And I think it's very important. The show gives a lesson to us that we need to be much better at resolving differences in our society so that we don’t have these sort of cataclysmic clashes like we did in 1991,” Miller says.

Other artists in Restless are Brett Graham, Lonnie Hutchinson, Parekohai Whakamoe, and Junior Ikitule & Dean Kirkwood,

RUSSELL RESIDENTS REMEMBER SACKING

Residents of Russell in the Bay of Islands are this weekend commemorating the battle there 162 years ago.

The centerpiece will be a dawn service on Sunday at Te Maiki Hill, the place where Hone Heke felled the British flagstaff for the fourth time while Kawiti and his warriors attacked Kororareka - as Russell was then known.

Historian Rawiri Taonui says Heke was responding to what he felt were broken promises and breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi by the new British rulers.

Mr Taonui says it's an event which should be celebrated by all.

“It's something that all New Zealanders should celebrate because the cause was always a just one and really it would be a test of our biculturalism the solidity of that, if both Maori and Pakeha were able top look back at Hone Heke and say he was a guy who stood on principle, and we should all be proud of that,” Mr Taonui says.

PASIFIKA FESTIVAL TIME TO CONSIDER LINKS

It's the giant Pasifika festival at Auckland's Western Springs tomorrow, and one Maori at least is looking forward to it.

Maori Party co-leader Pita Sharples has already made a contribution to this week's conference on Pasifika in Aotearoa featuring young Pacific leaders.

Dr Sharples says it's becoming clear that Maori and Pacific Island people need to work together on a political level.

“Our situations are very similar in a number of areas so it makes common sense that we’re together, and gosh, it’s about whakapapa. We’re just another couple of generations back and we’re Cook Islanders, that's the reality,” Dr Sharples says.

Well over 100 thousand people are expected at Pasifika.

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