Kawharu’s re-written treaty
Labels: David Seymour, Mike Butler, Sir Hugh Kawharu, Treaty of Waitangi
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2024
BY MIKE BUTLER
Complaints that the Luxon coalition government is about to re-write the Treaty of Waitangi are a bit rich considering that the treaty was quietly re-written under another administration nearly 40 years ago.
In 1986, with the 150th anniversary of the signing of the treaty coming up, the Lange government invited Professor Sir Hugh Kawharu, an Oxford University trained Professor of Maori Studies at the University of Auckland, to check out the various translations that had been made of the Te Tiriti Maori text.
He produced what is often called the Kawharu translation, and that translation was accepted by the government of the day. (1)
But Sir Hugh was not necessarily the neutral academic that high-ranking politicians and jurists apparently took him for, and what he produced was a reinterpretation that serves as a manifesto.
His New Zealand Dictionary of Biography page describes him as “a man of quiet persuasion” noted for “persistent advocacy for the Maori right to exercise rangatiratanga (self-determination)”. (2)
He served on the Waitangi Tribunal for 10 years from 1986 and contributed to 12 reports, including the three volume Ngai Tahu report in 1991.
He was closely involved with his tribe, Ngati Whatua, working on their treaty claims both in Kaipara and Auckland, and was involved in the Bastion Point land claim negotiations.
“Rangatiratanga” was the key point of Kawharu’s reinterpreted treaty that has 11 footnotes that carefully define key words.
In footnote 7, he asserted that the word “rangatiratanga” in Article two of Te Tiriti meant “unqualified exercise' of the chieftainship” and declared that it “would emphasise to a chief the Queen's intention to