Ki-o-Rahi (Maori football)

[Taha Maori]

Hot off our presses boys, sorry about the news article length Bob (easy, just take it one word at a time) -

Its a bit like a Keystone Cops drama or CIA bungle with leaked reports and "gagging" notices issued to key "players" involved in negotiations to compensate Maori for the use of their Intellectual Knowledge.

Helen Clark (NZ Prime Minister) has brought MP John Tamahere back into the fold, even though he owes the IRD several hundred thousand dollars - enough to put a 'regular' citizen behind bars for a very long time, because without him the legislation would not retain its so called "agenda" and momentum.

Other key players are Maori Intellectual Knowledge Law consultant Kingi Gilbert and NZ Rugby Union chief executive Chris Moller. In our national paper, NZ Herald (23/12/04), Moller stated that "several million dollars" would be "lost" from the NZ union coffers because of the adverse international exchange rates. The Governments estimation of compensation to pay aggrieved Maori miraculously just happen to be the same ballpark figure! You work that one out.

Why the "hush, hush" and aggravation in Helen Clarks Government? Because this cloak & dagger legislating has been 18 months in the making and theres still over 12 months to go. The unofficial 'official' date being bandied about for the 'shock' release to the unsuspecting NZ public is Feb 6, 2006. Now that date sounds familiar?

It sounds like a 'take it or leave it' deal is being brokered and Maori will not receive a just amount for their cultural heritage being so blatantly ripped off.

The claim is based on indigenous Maori ball sports being appropriated by the British colonists from first contact on to the late 1800’s. All because the development of rugby was not acknowledged by the British as having originated in NZ. I bet the French are now happy their colonists didn’t do the same!

Affected recipients of monetary compensation will, unusually, not be ‘all’ Maori, with payments not going to the Iwi authorities, but directly to only the sub-tribes (how will that allocation be worked out??) who still practice playing their traditional ball games. And this really shows how blatantly secretive the NZ Government is, they are using private investigators and their own SIS (Secret Intelligence Service) to locate the sub-tribal areas where ballgames such as Ki-o-Rahi, Poi Toa, Tapu Ae and Kiora (and others) are being played.

I feel this scheme is an injustice in itself – to me compensation should go to the descendants of the original ball playing tribes, not to the areas where our games may have suddenly just been started so that those people can claim some of the millions on offer. Real gravy train stuff. And get this, there is no lodgement process!, the NZ Government is sole arbitrator of which sub-tribes will get compensation payments! And what about Tamahere, Clark, Gilbert & Moller what will their brokerage fees be?

I would expect our media to deal more thoroughly with this issue, but will they?
And why the sudden need to acknowledge that Maori were ripped off? No it wasn’t based on ideals of injustice but the fact that scores of rugby pitches around NZ since the 1980s have been “tagged” (by who else, but “Maori Radicals”) in large letters, burnt in with weed killer, spelling out the historically traditional games associated in that area –sportspeople were/are annoyed that Pakeha ideals for funding criteria (such as from the now defunct Hillary Commission for Sport & Recreation) could not be applied to traditional ballgame organisations. Without funding, the traditional games could not hope to compete for consumers, and that is precisely what has happened.

The NZ Rugby Union was spending tens of thousands of dollars repairing its rugby grounds and having to cover-up “tagging” incidents, sometimes minutes before big televised games were to start! The NZ Rugby Union want to quickly, well relatively quickly going by the pace set by The Waitangi Tribunal, settle.

The great dialogue coming out of this clandestine operation is that once the NZ Rugby Union has paid off its minimal amount, the ‘cat can be released out of the bag’ and intellectual property law trouble shooter, Kingi Gilbert will lodge claims against ALL worldwide rugby unions, and against all sports organisations that play a sport derived from rugby- these include rugby sevens, touch rugby, rugby league and American Football – should be some battle with billion dollar claims!



So thats it fellas, looks like you've got 2 xmas' left before you have to frontup to the International Court (thats if you caught the last paragraph)
So salutations from NZ for 2005!
"Knowledge is good" Animal House