Te Waka Maori. GISBORNE, SATURDAY, MARCH 29, 1879.

Waka Maori, Volume I, Issue 26, 29 March 1879, Page 361

Te Waka Maori. GISBORNE, SATURDAY, MARCH 29, 1879.

As it is possible there may be a general election during this year, we make the following extract from an article on the Electoral Bill which appeared in a late issue of the Wellington Times, in order that our Native readers may know what electoral privileges they really have. We advise those of them who possess the requisite qualifications to lose no time in getting themselves placed on the electoral rolls of the colony if they have not already done so:— "Up to the year 1867 the Maories had exactly the same electoral privileges as the Europeans. In that year they obtained the additional privilege of a special representation which the Europeans do not enjoy. The ' Maori Representation Act, 1567,' enabled the Natives to send four representatives, elected by themselves on manhood suffrage, to the Greneral Assembly, and then, or shortly afterwards, two Maori men of rank and consideration amongst their people were nominated to the Legislative Council. Since the year 1867 up to this hour the Natives enjoy exactly the same electoral privilege as the Europeans, pirn the special representation. If a Maori has an individual title of English freehold to

a piece of land of the value of fifty pounds, he can claim to be placed upon the electoral roll of the district in which his property lies as a freeholder ; this right he does now extensively exercise. If a Maori be a leaseholder of land he may claim to be registered as such. If he occupy a house within a town of the annual value of ten pounds, or a house in the country of the annual value of five pounds, he has only to make his claim in due form and at the appointed time, in order to obtain the right to vote as a householder. If he be a lodger, his privileges under the ' Lodger's Franchise Act, 1875,' are exactly the same as those of the European. If he be a miner on a goldfield his Miner's Right gives him the same franchise as the Pakeha; and lastly, if he be a ratepayer, the fact of his name appearing upon the rate roll of any Highway District, Borough, or County, will without any action on his part, suffice to secure for him, as for the European, the right to a vote in the election of members of the House of Representatives for the district. As, however, the landed property of a Native is by law. exempt from direct taxation his name does not appear, or rarely, upon the electoral roll as a ratepayer. As freeholders, as leaseholders, as householders, hundreds of Native names are now on the electoral rolls of the Colony, and a 6 holders of miner's rights they vote in a goldfield district. Thus, as we see, being exempt from direct taxation which falls so heavily upon his European fellow citizen, the Maori has, by means of his special representation, greater electoral privileges than the European, whilst he is relieved from that taxation which gives a fundamental right to representation according to the political creed and custom of the British people. If a Maori will not individualize his title and convert his communal or tribal right into an English freehold with a Crown grant, that is his business. If he will live in a raupo shanty, or under a calicy tent, instead of in a house of the aunual value of five pounds, he cannot qualify as a householder: as he pays no rates, that door is rightly closed against him. It is clear that he can qualify himself, just as the European can, if he chooses to do so."