Waitangi Tribunal
Sir,—The National Party’s proposal (April 17) to restrict the Waitangi Tribunal’s jurisdiction to post-1975 Maori claims reveals a frightening confusion between pakeha convenience and the delivery of justice. The Waitangi Tribunal is the one adjudicatory body in Aotearoa/New Zealand sufficiently bicultural in membership and method to give Maoridom a fair hearing. Maoris cannot expect justice from direct negotiation with the Government, as Mr Bolger suggests, when that Government is accountable to an overwhelmingly pakeha electorate. Similarly, Maoris cannot expect justice from a return to pakeha courts, as others suggest, when those courts invoke doctrines of “aboriginal title” and "traditional rights,” which are themselves monocultural constructs. Those too impatient to allow the Waitangi Tribunal to evaluate the evidence before it need reminding that the claimants have waited as much as 150
years to have their case heard. The beginning of justice is to hear that case in full.—Yours, etc. CLAUDIA POLSKY. April 20, 1989.
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Press, 27 April 1989, Page 14
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155Waitangi Tribunal Press, 27 April 1989, Page 14
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