Letter: Why not Paihia?

Paihia. Photo / File

In the Tuesday March 21 Northland Age story reporting last weekend's "rampage" by youths in Kaikohe, I was interested to learn "just five police officers were on duty (at 1am Saturday) in three patrol cars across the Mid North, two officers in Paihia and two in Kerikeri, dealing with incidents related to St Patrick's Day festivities, leaving a Sergeant in Kaikohe."

We've already been informed "the weekend's trouble (in Kaikohe) started on Friday", with youths stealing 10 boxes of beer. The police knew their exact location, but with adults at the party "defending the youths" and "just two officers ... there was little they could do."
By strong implication this same address (actually named as being in Shaw Street) is where Saturday morning's youth rampage emanated from. I call that fairly predictable.

By comparison, the "incidents related to St Patrick's Day festivities" in Paihia and Kerikeri were entirely unworthy of being reported. I saw no other mention of them.

Crimes had already been committed in Kaikohe. Police were too intimidated to act. Despite this prior knowledge, four-fifths of available police personnel were sent to Paihia and Kerikeri.

That's really interesting. Why is that? Especially given that St Patrick's Day is virtually an excuse for public drunkenness? Perhaps lives were in danger in the east coast towns. But surely anything that serious would be reported? Or was only property in danger, same as in Kaikohe?

The youths apparently caused "about $1000 of damage to the iwi-owned [Mobil] service station". Is the owner usually all-but identified by name when property's threatened? Why say "iwi-owned" at all?

If the Paihia and Kerikeri incidents had been reported, would the street location be given? Would the property owner's identity be heavily implied?

I'm not saying any of these incidents are desirable. Far from it. I'm saying if they are equally undesirable why aren't they equally reported? It begs the question: Where does our 'news' really come from?

Also, why publicise a bad image of your own town? If you're attempting to solve community problems by addressing local concerns, wouldn't the whole, complicated situation be better dealt with locally, outside the glare of the media spotlight? If not, why not publicise the bad image of Paihia and Kerikeri on St Patrick's Day?

This begs the question, Who is focusing the bad 'news' on Kaikohe? (Or Kaitaia for that matter?) And why?

Most of what passes for 'news' stories these days are nothing more than press releases, political agendas included. Often its worse, it's social and racial profiling as well. Why?

WALLY HICKS
Kohukohu