{"id":69306,"date":"2025-02-05T14:43:46","date_gmt":"2025-02-05T05:43:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/feb\/05\/maori-protesters-turn-backs-waitangi-day-event-act-party-david-seymour-ntwnfb"},"modified":"2025-02-05T14:43:46","modified_gmt":"2025-02-05T05:43:46","slug":"maori-protesters-turn-their-backs-on-government-ministers-at-waitangi-day-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=69306","title":{"rendered":"M\u0101ori protesters turn their backs on government ministers at Waitangi Day event"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Anger at policies that roll back M\u0101ori rights surface as rightwing Act party leader David Seymour has microphone removed twice and protesters stage walkout<\/p>\n<p>If New Zealand\u2019s coalition government had prepared for political fireworks from Indigenous leaders on the eve of the country\u2019s national day, they were met with something arguably even louder: turned backs and silence.<\/p>\n<p>Under a blazing hot sun on Wednesday, political leaders gathered at the Waitangi treaty grounds in New Zealand\u2019s far north to celebrate Waitangi Day, which marks the signing of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2024\/feb\/06\/new-zealands-treaty-of-waitangi-explained-in-30-seconds\">Treaty of Waitangi\/Te Tiriti o Waitangi<\/a> in 1840. The treaty, signed by M\u0101ori chiefs and the British Crown is considered New Zealand\u2019s founding document and is instrumental in upholding <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/m-ori\">M\u0101ori<\/a> rights.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/feb\/05\/maori-protesters-turn-backs-waitangi-day-event-act-party-david-seymour-ntwnfb\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Anger at policies that roll back M\u0101ori rights surface as rightwing Act party leader David Seymour has microphone removed twice and protesters stage walkoutIf New Zealand\u2019s coalition government had prepared for political fireworks from Indigenous leader&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2286,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,503,897,56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-indigenous-peoples","category-maori","category-new-zealand"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2286"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69306"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69307,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69306\/revisions\/69307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}