America's Cup basher selling memorabilia

Ben Nathan

The Northland man who bashed the America's Cup is trying to sell the shirt off his back from that day over the internet, saying he'll use the proceeds to fund his life-coach business.

Ben Nathan, of Dargaville, dented the cup with a sledgehammer on March 14, 1997, in Auckland.

He was wearing a Maori sovereignty Tino Rangatiratanga t-shirt at the time and now he wants $1000 for the shirt and other memorabilia from that day.

The items include a United States coin from a taxi driver who took Mr Nathan to the bashing scene and a newspaper featuring a report of the incident.

Mr Nathan would have sold the sledgehammer -- but police destroyed it after his arrest.

He was jailed for three years after the attack, but apart from a recent conviction for breaching a protection order, he now says he is reformed.

He said he had put the memorabilia on the internet auction site e-Bay.

Mr Nathan has set up a business -- Tihei Mauri Ora (Maori life coaching services) -- and wants the money to go toward helping at-risk youth, including former prisoners and the unemployed.

The idea is similar to a recent sale by fellow Kaipara man and former MP, Ross Meurant, who led the controversial police Red Squad during the 1981 Springbok tour of New Zealand.

Mr Meurant recently sold an aluminium police baton from the 1981 tour to a South African buyer for more than $20,000.

Mr Nathan wanted to distance himself from Mr Meurant's sale, and said a prospective buyer had tracked him down through the internet, looking for memorabilia.

"I couldn't believe this guy. I thought it might be a set-up. He managed to trace me but his offer was too low," he said.

Mr Nathan declined to say what the offer had been.

He planned to set up six-week programmes to help youth and adults to learn Maoritanga, including whakapapa (lineage) and waiata (song).

Mr Nathan hoped the programmes would also involve actors, police and reformed gang members.

Participants would be encouraged to write their goals down and to have a real and crystallised idea of what they wanted to achieve in the future.

The venture is the latest in a line of varied work for Mr Nathan. Work he has done in poetry, writing and boxing has been critically acclaimed.

- NORTHERN ADVOCATE (WHANGAREI)