WEEPING FOR HIS RACE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 293, 10 September 1910, Page 8

WEEPING FOR HIS RACE.

| "There is nothing left for me to do but to weep over my Maori people" ! Thus, after a silence extending over a I period of throe years, did Mr Henare | Kaihau plead for a sympathetic hear- | ing from his fellow members of the i Legislative Assembly last week. The subject under discussion was the Animals Protection Amendment Bill, and the ponderous member for the Western Maori district, by the aid of an interpreter, and with much gesticulation, proceeded to utter a fiery denunciation lof the proposals therein contained. i Ever since the Treaty of Waitangi ! was signed, he declared, the natives I had believed that theirs was the right i to live, in and out of season, upon na- | tive birds and fish. If this Bill, with , its prohibitive clauses, was put into ' operation, there would be much wailing |in the kainga. From this subject Mr Kaihau drifted into a general talk upon the treatment metod out to the natives by an allegedly paternal Government. During the 15 years that he had frejquentedthe legislative halls not one i single measure had found its way on to "the Statute Book that was of any | benefit to the Maori. (Laughter.) : His long and continuous support of the party in power had been of no avail to | his people, and unless it soon bore j some good fruit, the Government need Ino longer look for his support. (Opposition "hear, hears.") Having got I thus far on the question of general ! government, it was an easy matter, ; for the 22 stone representative of the | Western district to drift into a discourse upon his old scheme for setting up a Maori Parliament. Why, he asked, should the pakehas laugh at such a suggestion. Did they forget that two members of the native race were ; members of the present Ministry, and | that one of them occupied the highest j position in the land—that of Acting ! Prime Minister. Surely, then, they j were in a position to set up a Parlia- ! ment of their own which, while not interfering with the constitutional ■ form of government, would have the | power to work for the good of the j Maori. The main trouble the natives I had to face was the restriction on native lands. This should be done away I with. (Opposition applause.) Under i the present system the Prime Minister ! stood up and declared that everything I was all right, the Leader of the Op- ! position followed him, and said it was all humbug, and the result was that no good accrued, and the native members between were two stools. It was time ' in his opinion that native representatives took up an independent position. ' (Laughter and applause). The wind was taken completely out of Mr Kaihau's sails by an assurance given by the Hon. Mr Buddo that the Bill in question would not affect the ■ food supply of the Maoris as far as ; naive birds were concerned.