Arrests at airport protest

HEATED SCENE: Police stand by as a fire burns by the airport driveway during the occupation. PICTURE/LAURENCE ERSTICH

Treaty settlements for Far North iwi yesterday were clouded by a 28-hour occupation of Kaitaia Airport by Ngati Kahu which ended in a blaze of tyres and five arrests.

Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Chris Finlayson labelled the Ngati Kahu protesters miscreants and offish during the debate in Parliament on the Te Hiku Claims Settlement Bill.

The airport occupation, which began just before lunchtime on Tuesday, was brought to an abrupt end as police moved in just before 3pm yesterday.

HANDCUFFED: A man is taken away by police during yesterday's occupation. PICTURE/EDWARD ROONEY

Action leader Wi Popata, of Ngti Kahu, said the occupation was a protest against a $100 million Treaty of Waitangi settlement this week.

The Te Hiku Claims Settlement Bill was read for its third and final time in Parliament yesterday ratifying the settlements of four of five Muriwhenua iwi - Te Aupouri, Ngi Takoto, Te Rarawa and Ngti Kuri. Ngti Kahu is the only Te Hiku iwi to not yet settle.

Northland District Commander Superintendent Russell Le Prou said negotiations with the protesters had failed to reach a resolution and police were left with no choice.

He said the last straw was Barrier Air refusing to fly medical specialists into Kaitaia, despite an assurance from the protesters that the aircraft would not be impeded.

About 20 police went to the airport and closed the access roads. The protesters were given the ultimatum of leaving on their own accord or being arrested. Six members of the occupation remained on a bench seat in the airport carpark and were each individually arrested.

Tensions flared when the departing protesters lit fires on either side of the airport driveway, fuelled by tyres and fenceposts. The Kaitaia Fire Station sent one appliance to put out the bonfires.

EXTINGUISHED: Firemen put out the fire lit by protesters. PICTURE/EDWARD ROONEY.

Protest leader Mr Popata said the fires were "signals". "It was to show the s*** we've been through. It's to remind people of the houses, the marae, the taonga that has been destroyed."

Mr Le Prou admitted the occupation had taken police by surprise.

"Police were not aware that this was going to happen. It was not on our radar at all."

Far North Mayor John Carter said flights were expected to resume by this morning. He said airport operators Far North Holdings and Barrier Air had been very supportive and patient while negotiations attempted to settle the stand-off.

"When we heard that medical services had been curtailed, that was the final button," he said. "We were worried about the commercial services but people's medical needs was too far. People's lives could have even been put at risk, that's a stretch too far."

The cancelled medical flight had ben scheduled to land at 8.30am with five doctors on board from Whangarei - including one dentist and one pediatrician.

Kaitaia hospital operational manager Neta Smith was at the occupied airfield this morning, hoping the doctors would be able to land.

She was extremely disappointed when the flight was cancelled and said it would have a real impact on the community.

"It's affected the people in the community. We're talking about children as well ... kids are being affected by this," she said.

MOVING ON: Hone Popata packs up as the protest group leaves Kaitaia airport.

Mr Popata told the Age threats had been made to prevent normal passenger flights from landing by placing cars on the runway. "We would have stopped them," he said.

He said the occupiers had agreed to allow the medical specialists in but Barrier Air was unwilling to take the risk.

As Parliament passed the third reading of the bill yesterday, pressure was being brought to end the airport standoff. Former Mana MP and close relative of the protesters, Hone Harawira held a heated conversation at the airport with the occupiers, shortly after a flight carrying medical specialists to Kaitaia for day clinics was cancelled.

Mr Harawira was asked about the discussion but replied, "ask those guys" and walked off.

Northland MP Winston Peters said the Government needed to act to end the occupation.

Kaitaia-based Northland District Health Board member Colin Kitchen was concerned hospital staff were unable to fly to Kaitaia.

"It puts the whole community, Maori and Pakeha alike, at risk," he said.

"We need those flights. We need medical people to be able to come up here without hindrance, before lives are threatened."

Barrier Air yesterday arranged a shuttle bus to carry passengers from the Te Ahu Centre in Kaitaia to Kerikeri for flights to Auckland. It was planning to do the same today if the airport was still closed.

Kaitaia Airport operators Far North Holdings chief executive Andy Nock said it was too early to discuss what losses might be sustained by the disruption to flights.

Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Minister Chris Finlayson said he had "no intention" of meeting with the protesters.

He denied that he told Ngati Kahu to "go to hell". "It had nothing to do with Ngti Kahu. That's garbage. I told some people who were occupying a beach up there during the foreshore and seabed [protest of 2010] that they should go to hell but that was years ago. It had nothing to do with the treaty settlement."

He said the protest was a performance and undermined all the hard work and negotiations undertaken by iwi so far.

A meeting with the protesters would be a "waste of time", Mr Finlayson said.

"I have no intention of meeting with [the protesters].

"I'll meet with Ngati Khu anytime but the reality of the matter is until there is a change of leadership up there ... it's not going to go anywhere. And I'm not wasting my time with them."

Wi Popata said the airport land was significant to three hapu of Ngti Kahu - Patukraha, Ngi Tohianga and Ngi Takoto. He said the land included boundaries which were important to the hapu and there were two urupa, or cemeteries, in the area.

A statement issued by Mtenga-Erstich whnau, Patukraha and Ngi Tohianga hap of Ngti Kahu of Te Hiku o Te Ika (the Far North) said the owners were "repossessing" their lands.

"The government took the land from Kataraina Mtenga in the 1940s and is now attempting to sell it to a neighbouring iwi," the statement said.

The government took the land in the early 1940s as part of its World War II effort, promising to return it at the end of the war. They have refused to do that despite extensive negotiations. The Erstich whnau has been asking and waiting patiently for over 70 years. The government decision to sell the stolen properties has resulted in the family taking the only recourse available to them which is, repossessing their lands."

However, there was clearly division within the Mtenga-Erstich family as Angel Erstich yesterday sought to distance herself from the protest.

"We're not all in agreeance," she said. "Whatever they are doing, I'm personally not in favour of it."