Wellington, New Zealand (AP)-A New Zealand parliamentary committee recommended the unprecedented suspensions of three Maori legislators A HAKA demonstration in the chamber of debate last year.
The haka is a dance sings of the challenge of great cultural importance in New Zealand, and the three legislators of Te Pāti Māori, the Maori Party, played one to oppose A controversial invoice This would have redefined the founding document of the country.
On Wednesday, a committee recommended record suspensions and a serious censorship – the hardest sanctions ever assimilated to New Zealand parliamentarians – after finding the trio in contempt in Parliament.
The legislators of the government block, which hold the majority, should approve the penalties during a vote on Tuesday. But the president of the Parliament, Gerry Brownlee, made the unusual step on Thursday to say that he would first authorize an unlimited debate before the vote because of the seriousness of the proposed sanctions.
The recommendations were the last turn of the heavy saga on the bill, now defeated, which, according to the opponents, would have caused constitutional and inverted ravages of decades of progress for the Māori, the Aboriginal people of New Zealand.
Why were Maori legislators suspended?
The video of the legislators in full cry drew global attention last November. The bill to whom they opposed was defeated during a second vote in April.
However, certain legislators of the central-law government opposed the protest of the legislators of the Maori party during the first vote and complained to the president of the Parliament. The problem was the way the trio crossed the floor of the debate chamber towards their opponents while they interpreted Haka.
“It is not acceptable to physically approach another member on the prosecution of the debate chamber,” said the report on Wednesday, adding that behavior could be considered intimidating. The committee denied that the legislators were punished for Haka, which is a beloved and sacred cultural institution in New Zealand life, but “the time and the way in which it was executed” during a vote, according to the conclusions.
A demonstrator against the bill on the principles of the treaty is outside the parliament in Wellington, New Zealand, Thursday, November 14, 2024. (Photo AP / Charlotte Graham-Mclay, file)
The committee deciding on the fate of the legislators has members of all political parties. Government opponents disagreed with parties or the entire decision but were rejected.
“It was a very serious incident, and people I have never seen before during my 23 years in the debate chamber,” said the president of the committee, Judith Collins.
How did the suspended legislators react?
The three legislators did not appear before the Committee during the conviction in April because they declared that the Parliament does not respect the Maori cultural protocol and that they would not obtain a fair hearing.
“The process was largely unfair, unfair and unjustified, which led to an extreme sanction,” said the spokesperson and legislative of the Maori Mariameno Party Kapa-Kingi in a statement. “It was not the process, it became personal.”
The report recommended Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke, who, at 22, is the youngest legislator in New Zealand, is suspended from Parliament for seven days. The co-leaders of his political party, Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, face 21-day bans.
Three days is the longest that a legislator was prohibited at home before. Suspended legislators are not paid during their prohibitions.
File -Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke speaks to the thousands of people gathered outside the parliament of New Zealand to protest against a proposed law which would redefine the founding agreement of the country between the Aboriginal Māori and the British Crown, in Wellington, November 19, 2024. (AP photo / Mark Tantrum, File)
Waititi and Ngarewa-Packer, the leaders of the party who recommend the rights of the Maori and hold six of the 123 seats of the Parliament, castigated the Committee process as intolerant of the Maori principles and identity.
The couple received more serious sanctions than Maipi-Clarke because the young legislator had written a letter of “contrition” to the committee, according to the report.
Why did a proposed law cause the demonstration?
The principles of the Waitangi bill treaty sought to redefine the founding document of New Zealand, the 1840 pact between the British crown and the Maori leaders signed during the colonization of New Zealand.
The English and Maori Treaty versions differ, and the Crown immediately started to violate the two, causing theft of mass land and generations of defense for the Maori, which remain disadvantaged on almost all metrics. But in recent decades, the protest movements of the Maori have made an increasing recognition of the promises of the treaty in the law, politics and public life of New Zealand.
This has produced $ 1 billion land colonies with tribes and strategies to advance the indigenous language and culture. These policies were the target of the bill, written by a minor libertarian party who denounced what they said to be a special treatment for the Maori when they were trying to rewrite the promises of the treaty.
