RESULT OF A MAORI MEETING.

Clutha Leader, Volume II, Issue 94, 27 April 1876, Page 3

RESULT OF A MAORI MEETING.

The following article is from 'Te Wananga' a Maori Journal published at Napier : — The meeting, or rather meetings, for there were several of them, which were held at the close of the recent festivities at Waiohiki, will be certain to have a most powerful effect in directing the course of public opinion amongst the Maori people of this island. Over, twelve hundred Natives were present at the principal meeting, and deputations were present from every tribe, and from nearly every settlement of the range of country lying south and east of a line drawn"from Wanganui by Taupo to the Bast Cape : Ngatigahungunu, Ngatiraukawa, Ngatiporou, Nagatiruanui, Te Uriwera, Te Arawa, and many other large tribes were represented by chiefs 'of importance. The occasion — the scraping, of the bones of two leading chiefs of this district — is one which is always taken advantage of by the Natives to discuss large questions affecting themselves andtheir lands. On. the occasion of the Waiohiki meeting, all the great questions of the day from a Maori point of view were fully discussed* The meeting opened with a discussion upon the question of whether the government of the present Native Minister and his colleagues is one deserving of the confidence of the Native people, and it was resolved unanimously, and amid great enthusiasm, that the present' Government is entirely unworthy, of support, and that no real redres of grievances can be obtained so long as they remain in office. It was also resolved with equal heartiness and unanimity, that, the maori people would look to Sir George Grey as their leader and director for the future. Other very large questions, such as the abolition of the Native Lands Court, the stoppage of sales and mortgages, the taking of land for railways, roads and telegraph lines, the necessity for increasing the reprer sentation of the Maoris in the Assembly the doing away with the trade in spirits, were also discussed at- length. Two points in connection with the meeting call for special mention. In the first place not a single officer of Government was present, although invitations had been sent. The second is that the resolution expressing want of confidence in the present Government was proposed by Kenata Kewepo, one of the most independent, influential, and enlightened chiefs of the North Island. Throughout, the proceedings were of the most orderly character, and, although spirits were plentiful, there was no drunkenness and no quarrelling ; in fact, no. more well, behaved and orderly gathering could have taken place amongst Europeans.