New Zealand’s Maori Gain Political Clout

 

By Henry Srebrnik, Saint John Telegraph-Journal

Since becoming Prime Minister, Mark Carney has been trying to edge Canada closer to its Commonwealth partners, especially the old so-called white dominions. Given this turn, it’s interesting to see how some of them are dealing with their own “settler-indigenous” issues.

In many respects, New Zealand has arguably the most robust process, perhaps because it has to come to terms with its very strong and united indigenous nation-within-a-nation, the Maori. This may have a bearing on future Crown-indigenous relations in this country.

Growing numbers of British migrants began arriving in New Zealand in the late 1830s, and there were plans for extensive settlement. Around this time there were large-scale land transactions with its indigenous Maori people and unruly behaviour by some settlers.

Fearing their potential total loss of the islands of Aotearoa –the Maori name for the country -- to Pakeha (Europeans), in 1835 some 50 Maori chiefs signed a Declaration of Independence; in return for the friendship and protection Maori would give British subjects, the chiefs invited Great Britain to protect the “infant state” from attempts on its independence.

What followed was the Treaty of Waitangi, the 1840 agreement, in Maori and English, made between the British Crown and about 540 Maori chiefs. The Treaty is a broad statement of principles on which the British and Maori made a political compact to found a state and build a government in New Zealand.

In the English version, Maori ceded the sovereignty of New Zealand to Britain and, in return, were guaranteed full rights of ownership of their lands, forests, fisheries and other possessions. But in the Maori version, the Maori believed they were retaining the absolute right to manage their own affairs.

The exclusive right to determine the meaning of the Treaty rests with the Waitangi Tribunal, a commission of inquiry created in 1975 to investigate alleged breaches of the Treaty by the Crown. The Maori population has been growing, with the latest estimates indicating a population of around 904,000 – about 18 per cent of the country’s 5.35 million inhabitants. In response to waves of Maori protest and resurgence in the 1980s, the Tribunal was given broader powers.

Since 1992, New Zealand uses a Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) electoral system to choose its 120-member House of Representatives. Each elector gets two votes, a party vote and an “electorate” (seat) vote. The party vote decides the total number of seats each political party gets. Parties also try to win as many electorate seats for individual MPs as possible. They must get at least five per cent of the party vote or win an electorate seat before they can have any seats in Parliament. 

Every area in New Zealand is covered by both a general and a Maori electorate seat; there are seven Maori seats, superimposed on the general ones to give Maori a more direct say in parliament. The other individual MPs represent 65 general electorate seats. The final group of members are selected from the party lists with no individual ridings. Proportional representation has led to an increase in minor parties entering parliament, making multi-party governments the norm. Recently, there has been support for the creation of Maori seats at local councils to ensure their needs are represented in decision-making.

The 2023 election saw a shift to the right, with the formation of a coalition government led by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s National Party, along with the ACT and New Zealand First parties, for a total of 68 MPs. In opposition are the former governing Labour Party, the Greens, and the Te Pati Maori (Maori Party).

Luxon’s administration has been criticized for cutting funding to programs benefiting Maori, including plans to disband the organisation to improve health services for the community. Luxon has defended his government’s record, citing plans to improve literacy in the community and move children out of emergency housing.

But the Maori economy is “thriving,” according to a July 16 report by the Wellbeing Economy Alliance Aoteaora. It found that the Maori economy asset base has grown from $69 billion in 2018 to $126 billion in 2023, an increase of 83 per cent.

In March Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters of the New Zealand First Party asked House Speaker Gerry Brownlee to bar the use of the name Aotearoa, suggesting a referendum would be needed for anyone to use it in parliament.

A petition had been launched in 2022 by the Maori Party to officially change the country’s name to Aotearoa, which received more than 70,000 signatures. “New Zealand is a Dutch name and has no connection to this land,” party co-leader Rawiri Waititi remarked. Since the current administration came into power in 2023, it has required that government departments prioritise their English names and communicate primarily in English, unless they are specifically related to Maori.

On June 5, parliament voted to suspend three Maori Party MPs for their protest haka (a ceremonial war dance) during a sitting last year. They opposed the controversial Treaty Principles Bill introduced by ACT that sought to redefine the country’s founding treaty, because it divided the country by race.

While it failed in parliament, it became symbolic of what opponents characterized as the government’s anti-Maori agenda. It drew nationwide outrage, and more than 40,000 people protested it outside parliament.

 

Trump’s Bromance with Brazil’s Bolsonaro

 By Henry Srebrnik, Moncton Times &Transcript

Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, is on trial in the country’s Supreme Court, accused of masterminding a plot to stage a coup after he lost the 2022 presidential elections to leftist candidate Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva. Another 33 people have been charged, including former ministers and generals.

It marks the first time in Brazilian history that a former head of state is being tried for attempting to overthrow the government. His supporters also attacked Brazil’s Congress building and Presidential offices in Brasilia on Jan. 8, 2023.

Federal police earlier this year released two reports that detailed the accusations, including that he personally edited a decree for a national state of emergency designed to prevent the election’s winner from taking office. Bolsonaro has denied plotting a coup but admitted that he had “studied other alternatives within the Constitution” that would allow him to remain in power after his electoral defeat. He abandoned the plan after leaders of Brazil’s military refused to take part. If convicted, he could face up to 12 years in prison. Bolsonaro, a former army officer, has praised Brazil’s military dictatorship which lasted from 1964 to 1985. 

Bolsonaro has already been barred from running for office until 2030, but is hoping that Congress will overturn his election ban. He called the ruling “a rape of democracy” and said he was trying to find a way to run in next year’s presidential election.

If you think this sounds similar to what happened to Donald Trump when he was defeated by Joe Biden in the 2020 election and then saw his supporters storm the U.S. Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, you’re not alone. The president thinks so too and isn’t letting it go unnoticed. He has singled out Brazil for import tariffs of 50 per cent, to take effect on Aug. 1, for its treatment of its former president.

When Bolsonaro won the presidency in 2018, many people called him the “Trump of the Tropics.” I guess they weren’t kidding. Like Trump’s refusal to acknowledge his defeat in 2020, Bolsonaro has also rejected the 2022 Brazilian result, when he lost to the left-wing Lula.

Trump has described Bolsonaro as a friend and reminded people that he hosted Bolsonaro at the White House in 2019 and at his Mar-a-Lago resort in 2020 when both were in power. In Trump’s first term, few world leaders were a more reliable ally than Bolsonaro.

After Trump lost the 2020 election, Bolsonaro publicly questioned the results and was one of the last heads of state to recognize Biden’s victory. And after Bolsonaro was defeated in Brazil’s 2022 vote, he left for self-imposed exile in Florida for several months, only returning to Brazil at the end of March in 2023.

On the other hand, Lula felt a political kinship with Biden as two leaders who saw themselves as having overcome attempted insurrections, and last year, Lula openly supported Kamala Harris against Trump.

Seeking to obtain explicit support, Bolsonaro’s third son, Eduardo, a member of Brazil’s Congress and his family’s most eloquent international voice, took a leave from his legislative duties and moved to the U.S. early this year. He did so to lobby on behalf of his father. It seems to have worked.

“This trial should not be taking place,” President Trump wrote in a July 9 letter posted on his Truth Social website. He called Bolsonaro’s prosecution a “witch hunt” which should be ended immediately. “I have watched, as has the world, as they have done nothing but come after him, day after day, night after night, month after month, year after year! He is not guilty of anything, except having fought for the people.”

Delighted by Trump's statement, Bolsonaro wrote on X: “Thank you for being there and for setting an example of faith and resilience.”

 This would certainly hurt Brazil economically. “He’s found that tariffs can be a very effective weapon modifying the behaviour of other countries,” according to Wilbur Ross, who served as commerce secretary in Trump’s first term.

Legal experts questioned whether the president had the authority to issue tariffs in pursuit of purely political objectives. Is a Brazilian political issue a threat to U.S. economic or national security? That’s doubtful.

Meanwhile, Lula has rejected what he called “interference or threats” by the U.S. and stated that he would respond, while maintaining that Bolsonaro “is the sole responsibility of the Brazilian Judiciary. Brazil is a sovereign nation with independent institutions and will not accept any form of tutelage.”

Brazil is apparently weighing imposing tariffs on specific American products or sectors, the government does not plan to apply broad-based tariffs on all American products. The United States is Brazil’s second biggest trading partner, after China and accounts for roughly 12 per cent of all Brazil’s exports. One possible impact of tariffs could be higher coffee prices in the United States. Brazil is the world’s biggest producer of coffee, and the U.S. is its biggest customer.

But recent polls show Lula losing to most potential candidates in next year’s election. Assuming Bolsonaro remains ineligible, the most likely winner would be the current governor of Sao Paulo, Tarcisio Gomes de Freitas, who served as the minister of infrastructure for Bolsonaro. The parallel to the 2024 American presidential election is apt.