Activists urge Games boycott

Press, 5 August 1988, Page 2

Activists urge Games boycott

NZPA-Reuter Geneva Maori activists attending a United Nations human rights meeting in Geneva said yesterday they urged black athletes to boycott the 1990 Commonwealth Games in New Zealand.

In speeches to a United Nations working group on indigenous populations, Maori representatives accused the New Zealand Government of apartheid and cultural genocide and said Maoris were denied independence. Mrs Nganeko Minhinnick of the Huakina Development Trust, said Maori movements also planned to call an international conference of indigenous peoples in New Zealand in 1990 “to focus attention on the plight of indigenous peoples in the world.” Mrs Titewhai Harawira, of the Wai-

tangi Action Committee, formally urged action against the 1990 Commonwealth Games in Auckland in a speech on Monday. “We ask the black nations to boycott these Commonwealth Games and not be part of the country that practises apartheid,” she said. She also attacked New Zealand Government preparations to celebrate in 1990 the 150th anniversary of the Treaty of Waitangi, under which Maori chiefs ceded sovereignty to Britain and New Zealand became a British colony. The president of the New Zealand Maori Council, Sir Graham Latimer, said he was angered to learn of black athletes being urged by Maori activists to boycott the Games. Such comments divided Maoridom and would split New Zealand, he said.