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Whangamata's estuary war hots up

By DEBORAH CUMING AND ESTHER HARWARD - Waikato Times | Wednesday, 14 February 2007

 

An escalation in Whangamata's mangrove wars involves threatening emails and claims of racism after another illegal cull.

Environment Waikato will today discuss whether to charge up to 150 people who pulled 2ha of the protected plant from the Moanaanuanu Estuary last month.

Those tearing them out call mangroves the "gorse of the sea", but the plants are also one of the world's most productive vegetations and provide food and nutrients for marine organisms.

Environment Waikato's Thames Coromandel councillor Arthur Hinds said protesters could not take the law into their own hands: "I think the disappointing aspect with the whole thing is Environment Waikato has worked closely with a lot of parties on a harbour management plan and this does compromise that."

The four-hour harvest on January 27 infuriated pro-mangrove groups. Nathan Kennedy of the Ngati Whanaunga Environment Unit sent an email, which went as far as Conservation Minister Chris Carter, referring to the plant cullers as rednecks and threatening their safety if they were not prosecuted.

"This is just one in a long series of insults and attacks Hauraki Maori have suffered in relation to Whangamata," the email said.

"If you are not going to do anything about it this time, let us know quickly, for my part (and just to keep my iwi safe, this particular sentence is not the official position of Ngati Whanaunga Iwi Authority), I will personally start organising some punishment for these bastards."

Mr Kennedy would not clarify what he meant by "punishment" but said Whangamata Maori felt they had received a raw deal from Environment Waikato, which did not prosecute another group of people who removed mangroves from the harbour 18 months ago.

Since then Whangamata Harbour Care, which supported the removal of mangroves from some sections of the harbour, has been working with EW, Doc and iwi on a mangrove management plan.

In December the Environment Court awarded Whangamata Harbour Care the right to remove, � by hand, � mangrove seedlings for the next 12 years. That decision followed an appeal by iwi against an original independent commissioner's consent for 20 years.

Protester Simon Friar, who calls himself the spokesman for "the concerned residents of Whangamata" but does not connect himself to any official group, � said people got "bloody fed up" and decided to take action themselves. "Around 25 years ago it was beautiful here, white sand beaches. Now it's all mud and it has been completely overrun by mangroves."