NZ pilot Philip Mehrtens who has been held by pro-independence West Papuan fighters for more than two months . . . Indonesian military operations have led to several deaths in clashes. Image: TPNPB
Jubi News in Jayapura
Church leaders across denominations in Papua have urged President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to stop military operations and to promote a humanitarian approach with negotiations in handling the Papua conflict instead.
Attempts to free New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens who was taken hostage by the West Papua National Liberation Army (TNPPB) on February 7 were highlighted.
Mehrtens also pleaded for an end to military operations in a video released by his captors earlier this week, saying: “Please, there is no need, it is dangerous for me and everybody here.”
Among the clergy voicing the appeal to the President were Bishop Yanuarius You of the Jayapura Diocese, GIDI President Reverend Dorman Wandikbo, president of the West Papua Baptist Churches Fellowship Reverend Socratez Sofyan Yoman, chair of the Kingmi Synod in the Land of Papua Reverend Tilas Mom, chair of the GKI Synod in the Land of Papua Reverend Andrikus Mofu, and moderator of the Papua Council of Churches Reverend Benny Giay.
The pastors said this concern stemmed from the fear of civilian casualties following the recent upgrade of Papua military operation status to a “ground combat ready” alert by Indonesian military (TNI) commander Admiral Yudo Margono last week.
“We do not want civilian casualties, therefore, with utmost respect, we ask the President of the Republic of Indonesia to strongly order the military commander to withdraw troops from Papua,” said Bishop You on Wednesday.
The Papuan clergy from the Interdenominational Church in the Land of Papua who made the appeal . . . Reverend Dr Socratez S Yoman, Reverend Dominggus Pigay, Bishop Yanuarius You, Reverend Dr Benny Giay, and Reverend Dorman Wandikbo. Image: Yuliana/Jubi
“And it is necessary to take a humanitarian approach, through negotiations.”
91 extrajudicial killings
Amnesty International Indonesia noted that from 2018 to 2022 there were at least 91 cases of extrajudicial killings involving the Indonesian Military (TNI), police, prison officers, while the TPNPB had killed at least 177 civilians.
Meanwhile, the number of security forces members who were killed in the same period was 44 with 21 TPNPB dead.
Data from the Institute for Policy Analysis and Conflict Studies (IPAC) also shows that the number of violent incidents related to armed conflict in Papua from 2010 to 2021 continued to increase, exceeding 80 cases in 2021.
In these violent cases, at least 320 people were killed, with as many as 98 percent of the deaths (316 people) occurring in Papua Province.
The victims are mostly civilians (178), followed by security forces (92) and members of the armed group (50).
Research from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) also revealed that violence in Papua is four times greater than the Indonesian national average.
This is ironic considering Papua has the highest ratios of security forces per population compared to other provinces.
Special envoy to free Susi Air pilot The church leaders asked President Jokowi to appoint a special envoy to negotiate with the TPNPB to release pilot Mehrtens.
“President Joko Widodo should appoint a team of special envoys to negotiate with the TPNPB, such as in the settlement with the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) on August 15, 2005,” said Reverend Socratez Sofyan Yoman.
“That is an example the current government can follow.”
Another negotiation alternative, said Yoman, is through the church.
“Let the negotiation team from the church approach TPNPB leader Egianus Kogoya,” he said.
Reverend Dorman Wandikbo said that because of the armed conflict, both Indigenous Papuans and non-Papuans had lost access to basic services such as housing, health services, schools, and churches.
“Today there are more non-organic troops in Paniai, Dogiyai, Deiyai, Intan Jaya and Nduga than in 2018.
Children ‘can’t go to school’
“Children cannot go to school because schools are used by the military, as well as the community health centers, pastorate houses, and churches.
“Papuans cannot stay at their home, many have fled to the forest due to concerns for their safety,” said Wandikbo.
Reverend Benny Giay said that their demand for solving the Papua problem without weapons was in line with President Jokowi’s public statements.
He hoped that Jokowi would fulfill his commitment.
“We as church leaders have followed the political development in Papua since August 2019,” he said.
“After all, the president himself in his speech on June 15, 2021, talked about solving the Papua problem without weapons.
“Even before that, on September 30, 2019, he had spoken his intention to meet with the TPNPB,” said Reverend Giay.
PNG media reports in the aftermath of the shooting say angry relatives and opportunists looted several stores with police shooting two men inside a local hardware shop in Kimbe town.
Police commander Chief Superintendent Peter Barkie has confirmed the arrival of Mobile Squad 18 to assist in easing tensions in the province.
Provincial Chairman for Law and Order John Rova said: “We are trying to address the issue and allow normal businesses to commence and operate and allow for outside communities to travel in to receive basic services.
“After the PEC meeting, we have agreed that a curfew will commence at 8pm and go until 5am every day and we will try to monitor the movement of residents because of law and order issues.”
Full investigation promised
Internal Security Minister Peter Tsiamalili Jr . . . says those who seek to escape custody do so at their own risk. Image: PNG govt
The PNG Post-Courier reports Internal Security Minister Peter Tsiamalili Jr saying Corrections officers are mandated by law to ensure that the orders of the court are adhered to and that they are stopped.
But he said any death was regrettable, and he offered assurance that when seeking to prevent a prisoner from escaping, the last thing that anyone wanted was for loss of life to occur.
He promised a full investigation.
“There are several points that I think is important to I make,” he said.
“The first is that the men who escaped were in custody because of the crimes that they had committed.
“In Papua New Guinea, our criminal justice system is underpinned by the Criminal Code that mandates that when individuals commit certain crimes that they must serve time in prison.
“In this sense, those individuals in prison are re-paying their debt to society.
“The second point I would make is that our corrections system is focused on rehabilitation and preparing those detained for re-integration to society.
“It is a requirement that prisoners participate in rehabilitation and re-integration programmes before they can become eligible for release.
“Those that seek to escape custody before serving their term of imprisonment are demonstrating contempt for our laws.”
Some escapees on remand However, Papua New Guinea’s Correctional Services Commissioner has confirmed that seven out of the 24 prisoners who tried to escape were not yet convicted of an offence.
Commissioner Stephen Pokanis said the ages of the prisoners who tried to escape was between 22 and 40.
He said the court system was often slow, which meant someone could be on remand for years while they waited for their court session.
“Time spent in prison as a remandee sometimes goes up to even eight years. For them I do not know but I would think they would have been in prison for maybe two to three years or more,” he said.
RNZ Pacific is investigating reports that a number of the prisoners who were shot had already turned themselves into authorities.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with Asia Pacific Report and RNZ.
A two-year investigation by Inland Revenue has found New Zealand's ultra-rich pay tax at less than half the rate of the average person. Image: 123rf/RNZ
By Anneke Smith
One of New Zealand’s wealthiest people says he supports a capital gains tax, as new research lays the groundwork for a fresh tax debate.
A two-year investigation by Inland Revenue has found New Zealand’s ultra-rich pay tax at less than half the rate of the average person.
The findings come as no surprise to many, including one of the 311 richlisters who responded to the government survey.
The man, who did not want to be named, made his fortune on untaxed capital gains but supports taxing those gains — saying it was only fair to bring New Zealand into line with other countries.
However, he said a more broad-brush approach — like a capital gains tax on all properties beyond the family home — would do more for the government’s revenue.
“You could take all the money off [rich listers] and it would fund the government for a day. The government spends about $100 billion a year and taxes about $100 billion a year, so anything that happens needs to materially contribute to the revenue side of things. Otherwise, it’s just the politics of envy.”
Revenue Minister David Parker . . . the tax report is not an excuse to attack the rich. Image: Angus Dreaver/RNZ
In a speech on Tuesday, Revenue Minister David Parker described the report’s findings as “ground-breaking” but would not venture any suggestions as to how the government might respond.
Answers – for the future
“What, if anything, do we do about that [disparity] here in New Zealand? We’re not providing the answers today. That is for the future.”
Other political parties have split down ideological lines with National and ACT on one side and the Greens and Te Paati Māori on the other.
National leader Christopher Luxon on Tuesday came to the defence of New Zealand’s uber-wealthy, arguing they already pay their fair share of tax.
“It’s not the wealthy that are the problem here… this government has pumped up asset values and the wealthy have done well,” Luxon told reporters.
“The top 2 percent of New Zealanders are paying about 26 percent of all our income taxes and I think that is entirely fair.”
National Party leader Christopher Luxon . . . uber-wealthy people “pay their fair share” of tax. Image: Samuel Rillstone/RNZ
Luxon said National would deliver “middle working-class New Zealanders” a tax cut, while Labour was “softening us up for a tax grab”.
ACT leader David Seymour criticised the study as a “politically-driven fishing expedition to find people with money and take it from them”.
‘Fishing expedition’
“[Parker’s] fishing expedition wasn’t about gathering information,” he said. “It was about creating a narrative that he can ride to more taxes on Kiwis.”
On the other side of the argument, Green revenue spokesperson Chlöe Swarbrick put up an empassioned argument for a comprehensive capital gains tax or wealth tax.
“The super rich in Aotearoa are much much richer than we thought them to be,” Swarbrick said.
“To allow millionaires to continue to not pay their fair share after this explosive evidence is a political choice. Poverty is a political choice.”
Te Paati Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi . . . “It’s just absolutely shocking, cruel and very unkind” that New Zealand’ ultra-rich pay tax at less than half the rate of the average person. Image: Samuel Rillstone/RNZ
Te Paati Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi told RNZ there was no excuse for inaction.
“It’s just absolutely shocking, cruel and very unkind. Until they do something about it Labour, National and ACT will continue to be the bullies at school picking on the poor people.”
The government was yet to announce a new tax policy but is promising to bring one to this year’s election campaign and Parker has signalled it will be informed by this latest research.
Hostage NZ pilot Philip Mehrtens as he appears in a new low resolution video . . . "There is no need [for Indonesia's bombs], it is dangerous for me and everybody here." Image: TPNPB screenshot APR
RNZ Pacific
New Zealand hostage Phillip Mehrtens, who is being held by pro-independence fighters in West Papua, appears well in a newly-released video.
It comes as concerns were expressed for the pilot as fighting between Indonesian security forces and his captors, the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB), intensified last week.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said he had received reports of the increased military confrontations and again called on the pro-independence group to release Mehrtens.
In the new video, which is poor quality, Mehrtens called on Indonesia to stop airstrikes in Nduga, saying they were unneccesary and put his life and the lives of other innocents at ris
The video statement was released by the TPNPB central command and purportedly filmed on Monday in Nduga.
The video received by RNZ Pacific shows Mehrtens sitting between two West Papuans — he speaks first in Bahasa Indonesian and then in English. He said:
“Good afternoon, today is Monday the 24th of April 2023.
“It’s almost three months since OPM [the Free WEST Papua Movement] kidnapped me from Paro. As you can see I am still alive. I am healthy, I have been eating well, drinking. I live with the people here.
“We travel together as required, we sit together, we rest together. Indonesia’s been dropping bombs in the area over the last week.
“Please, there is no need, it is dangerous for me and everybody here. Thank you for your support.”
The TPNPB issued a statement accompanying the video file urging Indonesia to stop its military operation to try and rescue Mehrtens and calling on New Zealand to mediate and initiate negotiations for his release.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with Asia Pacific Report and RNZ.
An archive photograph of Phillip Mehrtens with his West Papuan captors pictured in late February 2023. Image: TPNPB/RNZ Pacific
New Caledonia’s largest pro-independence party has been told that France is “panicking” and afraid of losing New Caledonia.
The head of the Caledonian Union Daniel Goa briefed the party in Koumac after a week of meetings of a cross-section of New Caledonian politicians with the French government in Paris earlier this month.
Goa said Paris kept reneging on earlier undertakings by pressing ahead with efforts to undo the 1998 Noumea Accord on the territory’s decolonisation in order to maintain its international influence.
He said there was major incomprehension on part of the French government of what the bilateral talks in Paris were supposed to be about.
Goa said Paris wanted concrete decisions in circumstances favouring the French government.
However, Goa said the decolonisation process and New Caledonia’s accession to sovereignty would be discussed in New Caledonia.
He again warned France against opening up the restricted electoral roll used for provincial elections.
Bid to extend voting rights
Anti-independence parties have urged Paris to extend voting rights for the 2024 elections after the 2021 referendum saw a majority of voters reject full sovereignty.
The pro-independence side, however, largely abstained from the vote in 2021 because of the covid-19 pandemic and still refuses to recognise the result as the legitimate outcome of the decolonisation process.
Under the terms of the Noumea Accord voting in provincial elections is restricted to indigenous Kanaks and those who have been residents in the territory since 1998.
About 40,000 French citizens are excluded from provincial elections but can take part in France’s parliamentary and presidential elections.
Goa warned of what he called irreversible solutions if France imposed a change to the rolls, adding that there would be a risk of there never being any election.
He said the survival of the Kanaks hinged on this issue.
Caledonian Union’s Daniel Goa . . . France needs to choose between moving in the direction of history or ending up in the “rubbish bin of colonial history”. Image: RNZ Pacific/AFP
Goa said opening the roll to recent arrivals would create a new imbalance and extinguish the Kanaks’ vision of politics.
‘Colonial state’ opposed
He stressed that the Kanaks would no longer allow the colonial state to impose itself.
He said the French state was pushing the Kanaks to their last entrenchments, but they would be present in their own way to take responsibility to liberate their country.
Goa said the Kanaks’ sovereignty was no longer negotiable, adding that the land is not a land of France and will never be a land of France.
He said it was a shame to imagine the worst, but France was going against the “wind of history” as the United Nations kept calling for the eradication of colonialism.
Goa said France had to choose between moving in the direction of history or ending up in the “rubbish bin of colonial history”.
He put Paris on notice that a refusal to restore the territory’s sovereignty would drive the Kanak people to seek support elsewhere.
Goa said France did not and would not recognise the Kanaks’ rights, which would prompt the pro-independence camp to turn to new allies.
France ‘lonely in Pacific’
He said all major powers were around the Pacific rim but France, as only a small European country, was lonely in the Pacific.
Goa said the French army never defended New Caledonia when it was threatened, but only killed Kanaks, plundered their land, carried out punitive expeditions, brutally treated and displaced Kanak populations, and killed their elders.
He also castigated President Emmanuel Macron’s China policy, asking whether France could be trusted.
Goa said France still wanted to give the illusion of existing in a concert of nations but the President, out of clumsiness, had betrayed his European and American allies by pledging allegiance to China.
He said in the Pacific context, France would on one hand “sell” New Caledonia to China and on the other hand, France kept saying not to deal with China in whatever way, brandishing the “Chinese threat” as the worst thing that could happen.
Goa said with the French presidency and the country adrift, there was a risk for New Caledonia to be dragged into a void.
Southern Province president Sonia Backes . . . threats of action in case of changes to the rolls “unacceptable”. Image: RNZ Pacific
Backes slams Goa’s speech
Daniel Goa’s speech was criticised by a leading anti-independence politician, Sonia Backes, who regarded Goa’s comments about the electoral rolls as a call to violence.
Backes, president of the Southern Province and a junior member of the French government, told La Première television that Goa’s threats of action in case of changes to the rolls were unacceptable.
She also took issue with Goa’s warning that the Kanaks would ally themselves with other powers, should their ambition to attain independence be thwarted by France.
Backes said the anti-independence coalition had referred the speech to the public prosecutor for alleged calls for violence and sedition.
She wondered if Goa considered that those opposed to independence had no place on this world and could not be asked to discuss the future.
Backes said the other side needed to explain itself.
Institutions not functioning
She said her side had an interest in finding a consensus because New Caledonia’s institutions no longer functioned.
She added that it was no longer possible to have 45,000 people excluded from the rolls and do nothing for them while waiting for a possible consensus on how to open the rolls.
Noumea’s marina . . . the anti-independence parties want Paris to realign the territory with France. Image: Johnny Blades/RNZ Pacific
After the rejection of full sovereignty in three referendums and the expiry of the Noumea Accord, a new statute for New Caledonia has to be created.
While the pro-independence parties want Paris to give a timetable to full independence, the anti-independence parties want Paris to realign the territory with France.
After this month’s talks in Paris, discussions will be continued in Noumea in June when French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin plans his next visit.
His ministry said in May he would go to the United Nations in New York to discuss the situation in New Caledonia.
The territory has been on the UN decolonisation list since 1986, based on the Kanak people’s internationally recognised right to self-determination.
Captured German trenches near Messines, June 1917. Image: Daily Herald Archive/Getty Images/The Conversation
ANALYSIS: By Jeffrey McNeill
It was observed […] that the English had slain wounded and captured German prisoners.
So reads a disturbing war diary entry of the Bavarian 18th Regiment from June 7, 1917, quoting one Schütze (Rifleman) Jakob Eickert of the 2. Machine Gun Company.
Another Bavarian soldier, Karl Kennel, was nearly one of those slain. He later wrote to the Red Cross that he and his friend Friedrich Christoffel were wounded when enemy troops bombed their dugout.
They emerged, belts unbuckled in surrender, and begged for mercy. Christoffel was on his knees with hands raised when a soldier pointed a gun at him and pulled the trigger. Kennel escaped death by rolling into a shell hole.
The Bavarians were fighting the New Zealand Division that day in 1917, at the very bloody Battle of Messines. Both Eickert and Kennel were describing New Zealand soldiers’ actions — then, as now, war crimes.
These days, New Zealanders and Australians tend to place their soldiers on pedestals on Anzac Day. We are led to believe these mostly volunteer civilian soldiers were an exceptional body of fighting men (something the men themselves also believed).
But this reputation came at a price.
Luckier than some . . . wounded German soldiers captured at Messines arrive at the New Zealand field hospital. Image: Alexander Turnbull Library/The Conversation
‘It was quite common’ Anzac soldiers should have known such killing of enemy prisoners was forbidden. The British Manual of Military Law, which codified the 1907 Hague Convention on land warfare, forbade soldiers from killing or wounding an enemy who had surrendered at their own discretion.
“This prohibition is clear and distinct”.
Furthermore, officers and men alike were expected to know these regulations. Yet as I show in my book, Taking the Ridge: Anzacs and Germans at the Battle of Messines 1917, New Zealand soldiers’ diaries and memoirs confirm that killing prisoners and the wounded was a feature of the fighting at Messines, and likely elsewhere.
Some diary entries were matter of fact: “Our fellows used the steel [bayonet] a great deal so there were not so many prisoners as there might have been,” wrote one soldier. “Lots of Germans were bayoneted on the ground, wounded men. It was quite common,” wrote another.
One wrote of speaking to a German he took prisoner: “He was like the rest, full of the tales of British cruelty to prisoners. They all expect to be killed and I am afraid I saw some very dirty work done, which might account for the tales they hear.”
Others simply distanced themselves from such actions: “I’m proud to say it never entered my head to [kill wounded men] or shoot down people with their hands up,” wrote one.
There are also examples of compassion and soldiers comforting wounded Germans. But other actions were contingent on the circumstances – a case of “them or us”. When Rifleman Edward Miller and his officer struck a dugout of “Fritzes”, for example, they took prisoner a solitary German. But they took no chances with another group of Germans, one holding up a white handkerchief – they were “finished off”.
The past on a pedestal . . . commemoration service at the Messines Ridge (British) Cemetery in 2007. Image: Jeffrey McNeill/The Conversation
‘Officially sanctioned’ The New Zealanders sent some 300 prisoners to the rear in the battle. But that is only half the number the adjacent British 25th Division took prisoner. The discrepancy suggests particularly savage fighting by the New Zealanders.
Individuals must bear responsibility for their actions, but so must their commanders. The New Zealanders’ senior officers’ support for killing prisoners tended to be tacit. A bloodcurdling lecture on bayonet use by the Scottish firebrand Major Ronald Campbell to the New Zealanders before the Somme attack in 1916 gives some insight.
Campbell had discouraged taking prisoners. Rather, soldiers should bayonet surrendering enemy soldiers when they put they hands up – “that’s your chance to stick him in the soft part of the belly where the bayonet goes in easily and comes out quickly”, Campbell instructed.
The New Zealand Division’s commander, General Andrew Russell, approved: “Lecture by Major Campbell on bayonet fighting – very good indeed.” Captain Lindsay Inglis, a law clerk before the war and a brigadier in the next war, did not. He wrote in his diary:
It would be interesting to know to what extent [these lectures were] responsible for deeds of the kind which even in war amount to nothing less than brutal murder […] We were astonished that it should have been officially sanctioned.
Lest we forget
Airing this dirty laundry may seem inappropriate for Anzac Day, especially as many men did not commit war crimes. But knowing what happened in battle provides a more complete understanding of their experience.
War is brutal. Despite headlines at the time proclaiming Messines a great New Zealand victory “for extraordinarily light losses”, some 3700 New Zealanders were killed or wounded in the battle. Around 3600 of the Bavarians opposite them were killed, wounded or taken prisoner. Only three officers and 30 men of the three Bavarian front-line battalions returned.
And war is still brutal today, with similar consequences. Investigations into the behaviour of Australian and New Zealand troops in Afghanistan in recent decades only underline the contemporary relevance of older misdeeds.
This includes the inquiry into the conduct of New Zealand SAS troops during Operation Burnham, and the Australian Brereton Report, which found serious breaches of ethical, legal, professional and moral responsibilities by Australian Defence Force soldiers.
By acknowledging this kind of behaviour has occurred during past wars, the public will perhaps be less reluctant to accept evidence that it can still happen. It should also mean the military itself will work to ensure it doesn’t happen again in the future.
Former Green MP Catherine Delahunty . . . "We are activists who will take our truth to power. And I don’t think lobbying is necessarily about taking truth to power. It’s about vested interests that pay for their interests to be privileged inside the power system." Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
If elected representatives have their work cut out for them to create the slightest social or political change through Parliament, spare a thought for activists.
For the committed activist, in it for the long term, their work brings them inevitably to engage with the parliament system.
Protesting at Parliament, demonstrating, submitting to select committees, sending in petitions, or just being there to watch, activists are an important, if sometimes misunderstood, part of the system.
And we’re not talking about the agitators who talk about “hanging MPs”.
The House offers a look at four activists who have long participated in the Parliament space — from single or multiple issue campaigners to the lifelong activist who became an MP and got out the other side alive:
Anti-war and climate justice organiser Valerie Morse . . . “Parliamentary security stopped me from coming to the grounds, and trespassed me from parliament for two years.” Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
Valerie Morse is a well established activist who has organised many campaigns in anti-war and climate justice spaces among others. Over the past 20 years, she’s been part of hundreds of protests to Parliament, and has made “dozens and dozens of submissions on everything from the environment to defence to the SIS to local body matters, everything under the sun”.
In order to get MPs to listen, Morse has sometimes used theatre in her activism. Some of the highlights include a naked protest on the forecourt in support of the genetic engineering moratorium, and entering a select committee hearing on Security Intelligence Service legislation with a group who blew loud whistles to highlight the importance of whistle-blowing — to the dismay of the MPs.
There have been setbacks. In 2008, during an event to commemorate Vietnam War veterans, Morse attempted to enter Parliament with an A3-sized sign about then-prime minister Helen Clark and former foreign affairs minister Phil Goff’s anti-war activism during the Vietnam War being at odds with their subsequent support for the war in Afghanistan:
“Parliamentary security stopped me from coming to the grounds, and trespassed me from Parliament for two years,” Morse explained.
“Subsequently I challenged that by coming on to Parliament grounds at a protest around slashed funding for adult and community education in the John Key era. I came on to Parliament grounds with thousands of other people and was arrested by parliamentary security. I had to go all the way through the court system, and eventually, the speaker of the house at the time, Lockwood Smith, actually withdrew the trespass.”
There have been some wins too, such as when large protests against the Iraq war 20 years ago helped convince New Zealand’s government to not join it, as well as the work of Morse and others at the committee level to leverage some transparency from the intelligence services amidst heightened public interest in mass surveillance.
“Those processes are often very difficult to see very meaningful change in during the short term. Over the longer term, there’s been changes in the way those agencies operate, so there has been some greater openness.
“But particularly around submissions, unless you’re speaking to some very, very specific item that they (MPs) think is perhaps a mistake or a drafting error, they’re often hardened down party lines, so it can be really hard to make changes in that process.”
The Messenger
Activist Mike Smith . . . “I think it was here that we presented the petition to stop deep sea oil drilling after a ten-year campaign.” Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
To convey a message of activism means to demonstrate it, according to Mike Smith, a leading figure in numerous environmental campaigns. Smith’s activism has encompassed “all manner of things” and he has proven effective at getting his message noticed. Almost three decades ago he took a chainsaw to the great pine on One Tree Hill, or Maungakiekie, to raise attention to Māori rights and shortcomings in the Treaty Settlement process.
In recent times, Smith (Ngā Puhi and Ngāti Kuri) has been absorbed in legal action against major fossil fuel users and suppliers over their polluting activities. But as we sat by the statue of Richard Seddon on Parliament’s forecourt, Smith took stock of his various forays to Parliament, from protests to petitions. He recalled the Foreshore and Seabed hikoi, mobilisations over asset sales as well as protests related to the Treaty — occasions on which he has delivered a message to Parliament.
“I think it was here that we presented the petition to stop deep sea oil drilling after a ten-year campaign. The prime minister came out and greeted us. We handed her a petition to halt deep sea oil drilling. She went back to her office, and within about two weeks the announcement came through that the government had indeed decided to put a moratorium on issuing new exploration permits,” he recalled.
“I think politics and indeed the law should reflect the morality or mood of the society at any particular time. However there will be powerful voices and vested interests that pull against popular opinion. It’s important that there are opportunities for the public to express themselves.
“The word ’demonstration’ sort of sums it up. We’ve got to demonstrate what that feeling is amongst the public.”
The activist from the far north said Parliament should be receptive to the expression of widespread public sentiment, and that it is up to the public to hold politicians’ feet to the fire if they are not responding constructively, or conversely if they are being accountable, to reward them at the polls.
“Anybody can arrange a meeting with ministers and they may or may not be listened to or heard, but there’s something far more powerful about an expression of a substantive section of society. I’ve been on marches where 50, 60,000 people have mobilised in Auckland or Wellington particularly on climate issues or (issues) about mining on conservation land. I know that the politicians, when they see that amount of people, they really do take notice of that.”
The Outsider Insider
Former Green MP Catherine Delahunty . . . “There were some issues I’d been involved in over many years that I wanted to see if I could advance.” Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
Catherine Delahunty isn’t the only activist to have been a member of Parliament, but perhaps what marks her out is the seamlessness with which she has resumed her activism and maintained a critical voice to power forged during her three-term stint, which ended in 2017. If there was any motivation to enter Parliament, she said it was to advance various kaupapa of her many years of activism.
“There were some issues I’d been involved in over many years that I wanted to see if I could advance. For example, the sawmill workers who were poisoned in the Bay of Plenty to whom I’m still deeply connected to and (on their behalf) lobbying ACC for change. I thought well, if I can get into Parliament, maybe I can make some change. And I did actually manage to get the National government to set up a national register of toxic sites and things like that,” the former Green Party MP explained.
In a sense, Delahunty never ceased being an activist when she came to Parliament. She used her wide range of connections with interlocutors from grassroots communities to media to civil society and political leaders in order to advance causes such as sustainable forestry, opposition to mining on conservation land, highlighting human rights abuses and the West Papuan struggle for independence.
“I started by protest. Been on many, many protests here in my life. In fact when I was an MP I probably went to more protests, because you’d see them out the window so you’d just go out to join them,” she explained.
“What you find out of course when you get here is: yes, you can make a difference, and no, you can’t. So if there was any conclusion I came to as an activist after leaving Parliament it’s that we need constitutional transformation of this country based on Te Tiriti (o Waitangi) and He Whakaputanga. But having said that, I still engage with select committees and I still engage with the system to get small things done. But I’m not under any illusion that we’re changing the world.”
“I always felt the system was rotten, but actually when you’ve been inside it you do have more knowledge and more contact. So it’s easier for me to walk in the door here now and have a chat with somebody that I wouldn’t have known before. Whether I can have an impact is another matter, but the first thing is to get through the door.”
When asked about the difference between activists and lobbyists, Delahunty said “we don’t have a PR firm who work for us to massage our messages, we are activists who will take our truth to power. And I don’t think lobbying is necessarily about taking truth to power. It’s about vested interests that pay for their interests to be privileged inside the power system. That’s very different from activists challenging the power system to actually do something in the name of justice.”
The ‘Gallery Stalker’
Drug reform advocate Gary Chiles . . . “It was all a bit of an eye opener. But I decided that I needed to know how things worked inside Parliament if I wanted to make change happen.” Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
Gary Chiles was only 13 years old when the Misuse of Drugs Act was passed in 1975, and it remains a bugbear for him that it’s still law 50 years later and that people are being criminalised for cannabis use or association with it. Drug law reform is Chile’s singular focus when it comes to his long running activism at Parliament.
Another regular protester outside Parliament during the Key years, Chiles decided to start going to the House to soak up the action inside the chamber. He made it his mission to attend each Question Time — around 90 days in a typical sitting year.
“It was all a bit of an eye opener. But I decided that I needed to know how things worked inside Parliament if I wanted to make change happen,” he explained.
“You’re not allowed to wave signs or wear sloganed t-shirts and things in parliament. But I found out the dress code allowed me to get in there if I have a suit on, so I bought a cannabis suit.”
Chiles stands out clearly in his dark suit emblazoned with bright green cannabis leaves, worn each time he attends Question Time. There he sits up in the public gallery, on one side or another, moving around to stay visible to MPs across the divide. A silent, persistent reminder of the need for drug reform.
“I think of myself as being the gallery stalker. They all know I’m there whether they’re engaging with me or not, and they all know what I’m about because of what I’m wearing. And it’s about reminding them (about the need for drug reform). What are you going to do about it? Do we have to wait another 50 years, what’s going on?”
Attending Parliament has given Chiles a greater appreciation for the work of the various parts of the system. He said that it has also humanised MPs for him, and that what goes on in parliament is often quite different to what is portrayed in the news media. Getting angry at the news isn’t political engagement, he pointed out, adding that the access the public has to this country’s Parliament is something unique and to be treasured.
“My whole attitude to Parliament changed the day that there was a person who set themselves on fire on the forecourt, and the first people on the scene to try and deal with that were Parliament security. That made me reappraise my attitude to them, because they walk the fine line every day between allowing public access and maintaining security, and I think they do a really good job of it.”
Short-term thinking The four activists all point to short-term thinking — the focus on retaining power in a quick electoral cycle — as something holding Parliament back from enabling systemic change. On the other hand, their own work to transform these views and inject a public voice into the deliberations of the lawmakers is very much long-term.
Johnny Blades writes for RNZ’s The House — an initative featuring parliamentary legislation, issues and insights. It is made with funding from Parliament. This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Dr Rebecca Miller of UNODC . . . blames "the collusion of corrupt officials and smugglers. They are essentially criminal networks". Image: Kalinga Seneviratne/IDN-INPS
By Kalinga Seneviratne in Suva
Since opening borders after the covid-19 pandemic, Australia and New Zealand have been aggressively sourcing Pacific Islander workers to help fill a severe labour shortage in their countries.
In the meantime, with investments from Asia, especially China and Korea, increasing in the region, Asian workers have been slowly filtering into the island nations, especially Fiji.
This month (18-20 April), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) held a forum attended by government immigration and law enforcement officials and civil society organisations from the South Pacific region to discuss measures to enhance data and information on trafficking of persons and smuggling of migrants in the area for work.
Why did UNODC organise the forum, not the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the agency entrusted with addressing workers’ rights?
“We know human trafficking and smuggling of people cannot happen on a large scale it is happening in the Asia-Pacific region without the collusion of corrupt officials and smugglers. They are essentially criminal networks,” Dr Rebecca Miller, UNODC Regional Coordinator, Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, told InDepth News.
She added that corruption within relevant government agencies had to be addressed because that had been the driving force in Southeast Asia.
“We need to start somewhere [and] we have found that governments in this region want to proactively address this.”
Concept note
UNODC plans to develop a concept note after this dialogue on trafficking in persons (TIP) data in the region.
The UN agency entrusted with addressing drug and corruption issues around the globe believes that the role of corruption in TIP and smuggling of migrants (SOM) has been particularly overlooked and undocumented in the region.
In 2021, UNODC conducted a training course for national officers in the Pacific on TIP and SOM, and its regional office has done a report on Fiji and Palau with the assistance of national bodies such as the Fiji Bureau of Statistics (FBS).
Preliminary results and findings were presented at the forum — the report shed light on how corruption facilitates such crimes, the actors involved, and the context in which such bribery occurs.
A closed-door session was held on the final day with government officials from the Immigration Department and the police to discuss the issues. An Australian immigration intelligence officer also attended it.
This process of sharing current knowledge on TIP and SOM and applying lessons learned to encourage regional action, UNODC argues, addresses Sustainable Development Goal 16 (SDG 16), which is Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.
FBS chief executive Maria Musudroka speaking on the forum’s opening day, said that despite the extent of these crimes, both TIP and SOM remain under-researched in the region.
Domestic trafficking
Referring to the problem of domestic trafficking in Fiji, she explained that researchers had to be trained to do it in a conversational manner to let the victims tell their stories.
Maria Fatiaki, Research Officer with UNODC’s Crime Research Section, who coordinated the five-year research project between 2017-2021 in Fiji, told IDN that during this period, through community-based research, they detected about 5200 hidden victims of trafficking. She said most were domestic trafficking into forced labour, agriculture, forestry, construction industry, service and retail industries.
“We also found foreign workers from Bangladesh, Philippines and China who have come here with contracts”, Fatiaki explained.
“But, once they came here, they found that the work was not what they expected.”
She added that in recent years Fijian workers had travelled across borders, and the incidents of them “being in exploitative situations” had increased.
“That is why now we are talking about [trafficking of] migrant workers,” she noted. “What is needed in Fiji is a training of border officials, and there is also a need for a questionnaire (to be prepared), which people leaving and coming in have to fill so that we can detect potential cases of trafficking.”
The Pacific island state of Palau has had Filipino workers flying in to work there for some years.
Pandemic reduced workforce
According to one of the delegates, 5000 Filipinos worked there before the onslaught of the pandemic. The numbers have come down to 2500 now.
“Palau is only a two-hours flight from Manila,” he said. Fiji also had Filipino and Chinese migrants working in the sex industry before the pandemic.
UNODC chose Palau and Fiji to study in TIP because both countries faced these issues earlier.
“Human trafficking is not reported as much as domestic violence [in the media]”, said Ronald Ledgerwood of the Micronesian Legal Service Corporation in Palau.
“This has got much to do with losing their jobs”, he added, explaining that exploitation of migrant workers in Palau occurs not in the sex industry.
He pointed out that a complicated issue to tackle was coercion that ha happened before their arrival, including hefty agent fees, false job promises and family connections (to trafficker).
“[When they arrive] domestic workers are exploited such as multiple jobs among families and violation of other labour laws,” Ledgerwood told the forum.
‘Raising awareness’
“Now the government is raising awareness in the community about the exploitation of foreign workers. There are now laws against human trafficking with mandatory jail terms, which could deter people from trafficking and exploiting foreign workers”.
As a lawyer, he also agrees that you need to build relations with people to speak up.
During discussions at the forum, participants from Fiji, Tonga and other Pacific Island countries pointed out that most of them have no laws against trafficking, and any cases detected have to be charged as assault cases under local laws.
Many foreign workers in the Pacific islands tend to come from China, the Philippines and Bangladesh. At the same time, in Fiji, people from other Pacific islands, such as Vanuatu and Solomon Islands, have been exploited at workplaces.
But they are on student visas, usually studying here. With Australia and New Zealand opening up their borders for workers from the Pacific, there are many agents here who are demanding hefty fees to get visas for locals to go there to work.
Recently the Fiji government has begun investigating the migration of some 400 members of a Christian cult from South Korea who have come on investment visas.
The church has set up farms, restaurants, spas, salons and manufacturing plants employing hundreds of locals, but some of the Koreans working in these businesses are suspected to be cases of TIP.
Under investigation
It is under investigation as a corruption case where the church may have bribed certain members of the previous government to get visas.
The US government has just announced a US$10 million grant through USAID over five years for a project called “Pacific Rise” to counter TIP in the region.
US Ambassador to Fiji, Marie Damour, addressing the opening session, said what we see around the world is “modern-day slavery”. She said the US government was committed to fighting this menace “because it is wrong, and it has to stop”.
“We now need to go into tangible action like improve prosecution, intelligence and coordination. We need to build on that,” Fatiaki told IDN when asked what the follow-up action would be.
“Now we have research [data] and established a baseline that shows the type of action we have to take”.
Dr Kalinga Seneviratne is a teaching and research fellow at the University of the South Pacific journalism programme and IDN-InDepthNews correspondent. IDN-InDepthNews is the flagship agency of the nonprofit International Press Syndicate. Republished under a Creative Commons licence.
Tahitian pro-independence presidency hopeful Moetai Brotherson . . . condemns the rushed deal between the incumbent Édouard Fritch and the Amuitahiraa leader Gaston Flosse. Image: 1er TV
By Walter Zweifel
Politicians in French Polynesia have reacted with scorn over the ruling party’s hastily-convened electoral alliance with an opposition party, which has been eliminated from the territorial elections after failing to reach the 12.5 percent threshold.
Under the deal, President Édouard Fritch’s Tapura Huira’atira ceded four positions to Amuitahiraa on the list of candidates for next week’s run-off round.
Fritch warned of “chaos” should his party lose power to the pro-independence Tavini Huira’atira, which won most votes in the first round a week ago.
The Tavini’s Moetai Brotherson, who wants to succeed Fritch in the top job, derided the arrangement, saying that Fritch and the Amuitahiraa leader Gaston Flosse were serving up the “same soup” by warning that white people would be chased away and independence would “usher in misery” if Tavini formed government.
Nuihau Laurey of A Here Ia Porinetia said while he also stood for continued autonomy, it was very hard to work with people who admitted that they had lied for 30 years, a reference to Fritch’s admission in 2018 that he had lied about the French weapons tests.
The Greens’ Jacky Bryant said that the hasty deal was serious as this way of doing politics contributed to voter apathy.
Coup for Fritch, Flosse?
He said Fritch and Flosse must “feel horror” if they believed they could be a uniting force, in particular since Flosse for years “vomited” over the Tapura.
Tauhiti Nena of Hau Māohi said it was a coup for Fritch and Flosse because if they managed to combine the two parties’ support from the first round, they would win.
In the first round of the territorial elections, Fritch’s Tapura party came second, winning 30 percent of the votes against Tavini’s 35 percent, with Amuitahiraa on 11 percent.
Flosse, who leads the party despite being ineligible because of corruption convictions, had been campaigning for French Polynesia becoming a sovereign state in association with France.
While in opposition, he claimed that Fritch was the worst president in the territory’s history.
In the last elections in 2018, the Tapura won two thirds of all seats.
Was it inevitable that Jacinda Ardern would face hostility from a noisy New Zealand minority that disliked being governed by a young woman, who became a mother while in office and who used the language of kindness? Image: The Conversation/Getty Images
This week marks the beginning of Jacinda Ardern’s life outside parliament, since she officially ceased to be an electorate MP at midnight last Saturday.
Her legacy as prime minister will be discussed and disputed, but there’s no doubt her influence will continue to be felt, both in Aotearoa New Zealand and internationally.
When Ardern delivered her valedictory statement earlier this month, I was in Canada as a visiting speaker at the University of Alberta. My lectures and workshops included sessions on gender politics and the pandemic, media representations of women leaders, and the possibilities for leading with kindness.
Invariably, audiences wanted to know more about Jacinda Ardern.
People questioned why New Zealanders appeared to have forgotten their country’s internationally recognised success in the fight against covid-19. They were curious about why New Zealanders were reportedly feeling antipathy towards a prime minister whose commitment to tolerance and multilateralism was praised overseas.
As citizens of a country that is home to three constitutionally recognised Aboriginal groups and numerous treaties, Canadians asked why the Ardern-led government’s Indigenous policy initiatives seemed so “unsettling for settlers”.
And they wondered whether it was inevitable that Ardern would face hostility from a noisy minority that disliked being governed by a young woman, who became a mother while in office and who used the language of kindness.
There was also some bemusement. The coverage they had seen of Ardern’s leadership experience sat at odds with their perception of New Zealand as an egalitarian and liberal society where women prime ministers and party leaders were almost commonplace.
More in common than gender: Finnish leader Sanna Marin with then NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in November 2022. Image: Getty Images
Gender politics In response, I drew on evidence demonstrating how the media often view women as a novelty in the upper echelons of politics. For example, in her study of news coverage of four women prime ministers from New Zealand, Australia and Canada, Linda Trimble reveals that gender is explicitly referenced.
As she notes, we seldom see men asked about the challenges of being a male leader, and this informs assessments of female leaders’ performance. The research also shows this use of gender references is most common when a country experiences its first female political leader.
Yet when Ardern became Labour leader, throughout her tenure and on her departure from politics, it seemed her gender continued to have news value: we first read about “Jacindamania” just two hours after she became leader, followed by questions from talk show hosts about her motherhood intentions.
The following year, a BBC interviewer asked about Ardern’s feminist credentials in light of her intention to marry her partner, and whether she felt guilt about being a working mother.
Even in late 2022, Ardern had to respond to a journalist’s suggestion that her meeting with then Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin was about them both being young female leaders.
Needless to say, both women rejected this outright, with Ardern pointing out the same question had not been directed at John Key and Barrack Obama.
Highlights of Jacinda Ardern’s valedictory address. Video: NZ Herald
Ardern’s ‘otherness’
The combination of being both a woman and the youngest prime minister in 161 years may have led to this personalised coverage. Certainly, having a baby while in office accentuated her as novel and newsworthy, nationally and internationally.
In her valedictory statement, Ardern implicitly addressed this “otherness”:
I leave knowing I was the best mother I could be. You can be that person and be here […] I do hope I have demonstrated something else entirely. That you can be anxious, sensitive, kind, and wear your heart on your sleeve. You can be a mother, or not, an ex-Mormon or not, a nerd, a crier, a hugger – you can be all of these things, and not only can you be here, you can lead.
New Zealanders will recall that Ardern did not seek the party leadership ahead of the 2017 election. Furthermore, when all votes were counted, Labour was a distant second to the centre-right National Party in both votes and seats.
But by navigating Labour into an unlikely coalition with New Zealand First, Ardern positioned Labour to win at least two terms in office. Had National formed a government in 2017, it may have gone on to win again in 2020. After all, that party’s leadership had considerable experience in managing crises.
Great expectations That said, Ardern’s version of an ethics of care and her emphasis on kindness were new to New Zealand politics and important to pandemic management. This eventually became intolerable to those who opposed vaccine mandates and managed isolation, and those disturbed by policies and programmes aimed at realising the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
But Ardern’s non-adversarial, inclusive communication style, and her demonstrable competence, helped Labour win back a large number of women voters who had steadily abandoned the party during its time in opposition under a series of male leaders.
Not long after Ardern became party leader in 2017, one political columnist wrote
that she did not “have to become Labour’s Joan of Arc to succeed”. Those “expecting her to be the party’s salvation and deliver them the government benches”, the columnist went on, “have set their expectations too high”.
Perhaps by promising policy “transformation”, Ardern set her own expectations too high. And by being a relentlessly positive young woman leader, perhaps the gendered media coverage was inevitable.
But ultimately she succeeded in saving Labour from ongoing opposition, becoming the legend it was suggested she could be. And, as I witnessed in Canada, there are young people elsewhere who Jacinda Ardern has inspired to lead with kindness.
