A Wellington iwi says abuse and threats at the protest at Parliament need to stop.
Part of the protest site. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
Te Runanga o Ngāti Toa rangatira Helmut Modlik said there is clearly a significant depth of feeling, but the protest was now in its 11th day and needed to be wound up.
When people are feeling pain, it is unwise to ignore their views, he told Midday Report.
The iwi recognised some had borne much more of a burden during the pandemic than others and they had the right to express their anger.
"Even though they're hurting, even though they're angry and disappointed with things, it's not okay to threaten people, to abuse people, to hurt people - that's not okay and Ngāti Toa is keen to see that come to a stop.
"In a civil society, that shouldn't be the way. The abuse and threatening and harm, that must stop, no ifs, buts or maybes."
He said in the last few days during the protest there has been social media content inciting people to come and abuse members of the runanga doing their work.
"That kind of inciting people to disorderly behaviour - that's unacceptable."
Two things needed to happen to break the current impasse, Modlik said.
The government needed to review the extent to which the burden has been imposed more heavily on some sections of society since the pandemic began and work out some options to mitigate it.
He said it could be as many as 30 percent of New Zealanders feeling this way, referring indirectly to the results of a poll released this morning.
"I think any attempt to continue to ignore that is very unwise."
At the same time there needed to be no patience shown for those protesters who were resorting to civil disorder, abuse, threats and other undesirable behaviour.
So far as the 400 vehicles blocking streets near Parliament were concerned, it was "a practical matter of decision-making by the police" to resolve.
Some of the vehicles blocking the streets. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Ngāti Toa has also condemned the use of the haka Ka Mate by protesters.
It was composed by their tupuna, Te Rauparaha, and the iwi has the intellectual rights to it.
Yesterday Te Ātiawa, on whose whenua parliament sits, also called for a resolution to the protest.
It condemned comparisons made by protesters to Parihaka as wrong.
A Te Ātiawa leader and chairwoman of Te Raukura Wharewaka o Pōneke, Liz Mellish, told Morning Report their collective responsibility is in looking after the people of Wellington, supporting vaccinations and delivering food parcels.
She said she too has been an activist - but the number of factions, threats and abuse makes this protest different.
