06/10/2026
MEDIA RELEASE
KAITAUA™ | NGĀTI NGAMURIKAITAUA
7/10/2026
Our whakapapa must not be used as evidence while our living voice is excluded from the process.
Today Ngāti Ngamurikaitaua placed our position before Hamilton City Council on the Draft Community and Sports Reserve Management Plan 2026.
Our kaupapa is straightforward.
We support the protection of cultural values and genuine recognition of mana whenua. But recognition must follow the whenua, whakapapa, ancestral occupation, history, cultural relationships and continuing presence associated with each place.
Council's existing organisational, contractual and consultation relationships should not, by themselves, determine who holds mana whenua interests in a particular reserve.
We have asked Council for practical safeguards including:
• place-specific identification of mana whenua interests
• direct engagement with the iwi and hapū identified through the evidence
• no presumed mandate for one organisation to speak for another hapū
• clear provenance for whakapapa and cultural information
• a right of response where cultural information is disputed
• direct engagement over naming, interpretation, artwork and storytelling
• a reserve-by-reserve review where Council's records identify Ngāti Ngamurikaitaua relationships.
Our position is not that Council should determine our whakapapa or give us mana.
Council does not create our relationship with our whenua.
The principle is simple:
Recognition requires relationship. Relationship requires mandate.
Representation should carry our voice, not replace it.
And above all:
Our whakapapa must not be used as evidence while our living voice is excluded from the process.
Ngāti Ngamurikaitaua has also elected to speak to our written record when verbal submissions are heard by Council on 5 November 2026. The Council consultation information identifies that meeting as the opportunity for submitters to speak.
Ngāti Ngamurikaitaua is still here. We speak for ourselves.
Kia whakatōmuri te haere whakamua.
We walk backwards into the future with our eyes fixed upon the past.
KAITAUA™ | Ngāti Ngamurikaitaua
