New Zealand’s parliament has voted to suspend three Māori MPs for their protest haka during a sitting last year.
Opposition MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, who started the traditional dance, was suspended for seven days, while her party’s co-leaders Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer were banned for 21 days.
The MPs did the haka when asked if their Te Pāti Māori or Māori Party, supported a bill that sought to redefine the country’s founding treaty with Māori people.
The Treaty Principles Bill has since been voted down but it drew nationwide outrage – and more than 40,000 people protested outside parliament during the bill’s first reading in November last year.
We have been “punished for being Māori”, Ngarewa-Packer told the BBC. “We take on the stance of being unapologetically Māori and prioritising what our people need or expect from us.”
There were tense exchanges on Thursday as the house debated penalties, with Foreign Minister Winston Peters being asked to apologise for calling Te Pāti Māori a “bunch of extremists” and saying the country “has had enough of them”.
“We will never be silenced, and we will never be lost,” Maipi-Clarke, who at 22 is the youngest MP, said at one point, holding back tears.
“Are our voices too loud for this house – is that why we are being punished?”
Last month, a parliamentary committee proposed suspending the MPs, It ruled that the haka, which brought parliament to a temporary halt, could have “intimidated” other lawmakers.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon had rejected accusations then that the committee’s ruling was “racist”, adding that the issue was “not about haka”, but about “parties not following the rules of parliament”.
Following a heated debate, the suspensions handed out on Thursday are the longest any New Zealand lawmaker has faced. The previous record was three days.
New Zealand has long been lauded for upholding indigenous rights, but relations with the Māori community have been strained recently under the current conservative government Luxon-led government.
His administration has been criticised for cutting funding to programmes benefiting Māori, including plans to disband an organisation that aims to improve health services for the community.
Luxon though has defended his government’s record on Māori issues, citing plans to improve literacy in the community and move children out of emergency housing.
The Treaty Principles Bill that has been at the heart of this tension. It sought to legally define the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, the pact the British Crown and Māori leaders signed in 1840 during New Zealand’s colonisation.
The bill’s defenders, such as Act, the right-wing party that tabled it, argue the 1840 treaty needs to be reinterpreted because it had divided the country by race, and does not represent today’s multicultural society.
Critics, however, say it is the proposed bill that would be divisive and lead to the unravelling of much-needed protections for many Māori.
The bill sparked a hīkoi, or peaceful protest march, that lasted nine days, beginning in the far north and culminating in the capital Wellington. It grew to more than 40,000 by the end, becoming one of the country’s biggest marches ever.
The Treaty Principles Bill was eventually voted down by 112 votes to 11 in April, days after a government committee recommended that it should not proceed. The party holds six seats in the 123-member parliament.
