East coast Maori groups are challenging the Ngati Porou body that negotiated a $110 million Treaty settlement in the hope of stopping the deal in its tracks.
They want the Waitangi Tribunal, which is sitting under urgency this week, to halt the settlement, which would address historic claims from Gisborne
north around the East Cape.
But the tribunal has limited ability to do so, because it can only recommend that course to the Government.
Te Runanga o Ngati Porou negotiated the provisional deal, which includes cash, forestry, carbon credits, conservation reserves and the option to buy Crown-owned land. It is consulting grassroots Ngati Porou people about the deal and hopes are high that it will go through the legislative process next year.
However, lawyer Darrell Naden, who represents Treaty claimants from groups Uepohatu, Ruawaipu and Te Aitanga a Hauiti, said his clients never wanted the runanga to negotiate on their behalf because Ngati Porou was not an iwi they recognised.
"We're challenging the runanga's right to deal with the historical claims because they're not tangata whenua. I know they've got the branding, but if you look at the whakapapa and the history it's not them," Mr Naden said.
Runanga chairman Api Mahuika did not return calls yesterday.
In a tribunal memo, Judge Stephen Clark said the crux of the conflict was that there were claimants on the east coast who believed that they had independent "autonomous" identities and who did not want to be part of the "general rubric of Ngati Porou".
During the hearing, the tribunal would take as its "starting point" that the Crown was aware of the dispute when it started negotiations.
Judge Craig Coxhead began the three-day hearing yesterday in Wellington.
In a short statement, a spokesperson for Treaty Negotiations Minister Christopher Finlayson said the issue boiled down to the integrity of the mandate process, which the Government recognised in April 2008.
"The Crown is confident that the process under which the runanga gained its mandate was robust, that the mandate is sound and negotiations have proceeded on that basis.
"The negotiations are now well advanced and we are optimistic a deed of settlement will be signed next year."
