THE OMARANUI LAND DISPUTE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3165, 20 August 1881, Page 3

THE OMARANUI LAND DISPUTE.

[To the Editor of the Daily. Teleghuph.] Sx», —In yesterday's issue you state that Mr Ormond has presented to tbe House a petition from the natives in reference to the Omaranui land dispute, and that he was examined before the Native Affairs Committee, when his crossexamination by Mr Sutton elicited information that otherwise would not have come out. Kindly permit me to say that the petition was presented early in this lesßion by Mr Henare Tomoana.and that Mr Ormond is reported to have stated before the committee that he has arrived at the conclusion that the piece of land in dispute has by mistake been included in the conveyance to Mr Sutton. That Mr Ormond has good grounds for his opinion is proved by the evidence given by Mr Sutton before the Hawke's Bay Native Lands Alienation Commission (see pages 119 to 121 of the leport presented to Parliament by its chairman, Mr Justice Richmond, in 1863). Mr Sutton states before the Commission that te bought the Omaranui No. 1 block on the Ist April, 1869, for £2500, and that he sold it on the 15th May, 1969, to Mr Braithwaite for £3000. Mr Sutton parted with the whole block as he bought it, at a profit of £500, reserving no portion of the land. The Commission sat from May to July, 1873—that is more than four years after the sale of tbe Omaranui block to Mr Brathwaite—and during all that time the natives were in possession of the disputed land, Mr Sutton never having obtained ownership. Some considerable time later Mr Sutton seems to have discovered that the land in dispute was included in the conveyance to him. He then claimed ownership, but the natives refused to render up possession, as they never had sold the land, until they were forcibly turned off this year by the Sheriff's officers.—l am, &c,

Charles Weber, Napier, August 19, 1881.