Shaneel Lal: Teaching true history of Treaty of Waitangi in schools is crucial

Te Tiriti and the Treaty are not translations of each other; they are documents containing conflicting terms. Photo / David Fisher

OPINION

I moved to Aotearoa without any knowledge of its history. Before I could learn anything about its colonisation and the subsequent harm it caused to Māori, I was already inundated with views that insisted that Māori were getting special treatment or an unfair advantage over tauiwi and Pākehā students.

Meanwhile, I was taught in history classes that Te Tiriti o Waitangi was merely a translation of The Treaty of Waitangi. The Treaty said that Māori unreservedly ceded sovereignty to the Queen and gave her agents the power to make and enforce laws over all people in Aotearoa.

My understanding of Aotearoa’s history and present political landscape at that time was that Māori chiefs chose to hand over sovereignty to the Queen for protection from the British Empire. To the ignorant mind, it appeared that Māori made terrible decisions and were complaining because they did not like the result.

I was in Year 9. I felt like I was working incredibly hard and I was being lied to that it did not matter how diligently I worked, Māori students would always be prioritised over me plainly because they belonged to a different race. The education system made it reasonable and convenient to be resentful towards Māori.

Six years later, I went to law school and, for the first time, heard of He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni, a document signed by northern chiefs in 1835 which declared Aotearoa an independent sovereign nation.

Five years later, in 1840, James Busby and William Hobson wrote the Treaty. In Article One, Māori ceded sovereignty to the Queen.

Missionary Henry Williams and his son Edward wrote Te Tiriti. In Article One, Māori ceded kāwanatanga (governorship) to the Queen but in Article Two, Māori secured tino rangatiratanga (sovereignty).

Of the 540 chiefs, only 39 signed the non-Māori text.

Te Tiriti and the Treaty are not translations of each other. They are documents containing conflicting terms. In its inquiry into Te Paparahi o te Raki, the Waitangi Tribunal found that Māori did not cede sovereignty.

The Crown established a government and used force and deception to take sovereignty. It led to the significant loss of culture, language, land and life.

When people see the treaties as a translation of each other, it is easy to become a victim of the anti-Māori rhetoric. However, on a proper understanding of the treaties, interventions such as co-governance of resources, bilingual road signs, a quarter century of Treaty settlements worth two months of superannuation payments, and Māori seats on councils and Parliament in return for the theft of sovereignty look like the bare minimum.

Education should not be locked behind tall university walls and a $40,000 fee. Teaching Aotearoa’s true history in schools is crucial to fostering a future in which tauiwi and Pākehā uphold our obligations to Māori.

Keeping young people ignorant of our history would create a generation that would go through the world with the false impression that Māori are getting an unfair advantage as our governments slowly move to provide colonial reparations and uphold Te Tiriti.

People who oppose teaching Aotearoa’s history in school tend to spin education as guilting tauiwi and Pākehā students into feeling responsible for the poor health, education and socioeconomic outcomes of Māori. I have never met a young white person who feels guilty or responsible for Aotearoa’s colonisation. Young people recognise that no one has the power to change history, but we all have the power to shape the future.

Formal equality in systems aimed at destroying positive prospects for Māori is inherently unjust. We must take intentional steps to address the inevitable outcomes for Māori. It is time to leave the racist special treatment, unfair advantage and handout narrative in the past and lead with the intention of upholding Te Tiriti.

Shaneel Shavneel Lal (they/them) was instrumental in the bill to ban conversion therapy in New Zealand. They are a law and psychology student, model and influencer.