Hawke’s Bay iwi Ngāti Kahungunu is calling on the British Museum in London to return taonga (treasured Māori items) taken from their Waimārama area more than a century ago.
The British Museum holds several thousand Māori taonga, and more than 600 of them come from Waimārama alone. Many were taken after a British settler named Frederick Meinertzhagen leased 35,000 acres of land there in 1868 — land that included pā sites and burial grounds where ancestors had been laid to rest with their taonga.
Ngāti Kahungunu chairman Bayden Barber said the iwi are direct descendants of the people the taonga belonged to. “It belongs to us, it belongs to our ancestors, it belongs to our iwi,” he said, adding that the British Museum holds the largest collection of Māori items outside New Zealand.
The British Museum did not directly answer the request, saying only that it “would welcome the opportunity to speak with representatives of Ngāti Kahungunu.”
A member of the UK’s House of Lords, Paul Boateng, has also backed calls for change. Leaders from Commonwealth countries, including New Zealand, meet in Antigua and Barbuda this week, where the issue is expected to come up. Some ancestral remains from Waimārama were already returned to New Zealand back in 2008.
Māori Version
E Tono ana tētahi Iwi kia Whakahokia Mai ā Rātou Taonga i te UK
E tono ana a Ngāti Kahungunu, te iwi o Te Matau-a-Māui, ki te Whare Taonga o Peretana i Rānana kia whakahokia mai ngā taonga Māori i tangohia i tō rātou rohe o Waimārama neke atu i te kotahi rau tau ki muri.
He maha mano ngā taonga Māori kei te Whare Taonga o Peretana, ā, neke atu i te 600 o aua taonga nō Waimārama anake. He tokomaha i tangohia i muri i te rīhi a tētahi Pākehā, a Frederick Meinertzhagen, i te 35,000 eka whenua i reira i te tau 1868 — he whenua i uru atu ngā pā me ngā urupā i tanumia ai ngā tīpuna me ō rātou taonga.
I kī te tiamana o Ngāti Kahungunu, a Bayden Barber, he uri tōtika te iwi nō ngā tāngata nāna aua taonga. “Nō mātou tērā, nō ō mātou tīpuna, nō tō mātou iwi,” tāna i kī, me te tāpiri he kohinga Māori nui rawa atu kei waho o Aotearoa kei te Whare Taonga o Peretana.
Kīhai i whakautu tika te Whare Taonga o Peretana ki te tono, engari i kī noa iho ka “hari mai i te wātea ki te kōrero ki ngā kaiwhakakanohi o Ngāti Kahungunu.”
Kua tautoko hoki tētahi mema o te House of Lords o te UK, a Paul Boateng, i te tono mō te huringa. Ka hui ngā kaiārahi o ngā whenua o te Commonwealth, tae atu ki Aotearoa, i Antigua me Barbuda i tēnei wiki, ā, e tūmanakohia ana ka whakaarohia tēnei take i reira. I whakahokia kē mai ētahi tīpuna toto nō Waimārama ki Aotearoa i te tau 2008.
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