Iwi helped to find members

By RUTH BERRY

A nationwide $4.8 million campaign designed to link iwi organisations with their tribal members was launched yesterday after seven years in the planning.

Tuhono - the Maori affiliation service - will collect electoral information from consenting Maori voters and forward the details to their iwi organisations.

The aim is to help iwi authorities connect with as many of their members as possible - and to ensure their registers are up to date.

Ngati Maniapoto's Dan Te Kanawa, one of the project's key drivers, said the idea was first floated in 1993. It resulted in a 2002 change to the Electoral Act to enable the Chief Registrar of Electors to seek permission from voters to have their enrolment details and iwi affiliation shared with Tuhono, the operational arm of the Tautoko Maori Trust.

In April the Chief Registrar will contact the more than 360,000 voters on the Maori roll and those on general rolls who have identified their Maori ethnicity, informing them of the project.

Those voters will then be contacted, and asked whether they will give their consent to provide their details to Tuhono.


The Waitangi Fisheries Commission, which has contributed $700,000 to the new project, has for several years provided a service designed to help Maori unaware of their iwi affiliations to trace them.

But it had been targeted only at those who did not know their whakapapa and had relied on people coming forward - unlike the new initiative - which enabled people to be approached.

Mr Te Kanawa said Tuhono would also provide a service to help those people who did not know their whakapapa to identify their iwi.