Gisborne district councillors have voted in favour of permanently installing two new replicas of Captain Cook's ship the Endeavour in the region without consulting iwi or the wider public.
Wooden statues of the Endeavour at Gladstone Road in Gisborne that were removed years ago. Photo: Supplied / Cook Islands News
It follows the controversial 250-year commemoration of Cook's landing there last year, which drew widespread protest and outrage from many Māori.
In an Operations Committee's agenda document yesterday, one option included that the public and iwi could be consulted but warned that doing so would be expensive and time-consuming.
Gisborne councillors voted 11 to 3 in favour of instead having the community stump up the funds to install the replicas, with no public consultation.
The Tuia 250 commemorations last year, which saw another Endeavour replica voyage around the country, was highly controversial. Iwi refused to allow the replica of the Endeavour used during the commemoration to dock on their shores or be involved in a pōwhiri to welcome the fleet.
The council's latest decision has left local community worker and vocal opponent of Tuia 250, Tuta Ngarimu, in utter disbelief.
"I just can't believe it," he said.
"They've totally rail-roaded over everything we've just finished doing with the Tuia 250. And I know that if this was to go ahead, we would probably look at another major protest here because of what Captain Cook and his visit here means to Māori here."
He said the replica was a horrific reminder for many Māori in Gisborne of when nine of their ancestors were shot and killed upon Cook's arrival there 250 years ago.
Gisborne's Mayor and deputy mayor were unavailable to speak to RNZ, but councillor Meredith Akuhata-Brown, one of the three councillors to vote against the move, said she was extremely disappointed.
"Within the space of us in our elected role, our community should always be consulted about significant movements, be it in a cultural context or in infrastructure," she said.
"We contradict ourselves multiple times over. I was whole heartedly disappointed."
The two new replicas will replace old wooden replicas of the Endeavour which were removed from Gisborne's streets years ago.
The council agreed to help fund the construction of new replicas in 2018 made completely out of aluminium to prologue their lifespan, and they have been sitting in storage ever since.
Akuhata-Brown said iwi were not consulted about the original strictures either.
"There was never any consultation when they were first put up, so this is a constant play-out by non-Māori that we shouldn't have to ask you," she said.
"I suspect iwi will be very unhappy to hear this news and there will be some consideration from them to what council needs to do."
If the community can find the $37,000 it's going to cost to install the replicas and pay for a resource consent, they will likely be placed in the same area the old wooden structures once stood on Gladstone Road.
The street is considered to be within the rohe of local iwi Rongowhakaata.
The iwi trust's general manager Amohaere Houkamau said she still had faith in the mayor to do the right thing.
"Even if it's the recommendation of that committee, they've come to understand that the relationship with iwi is critical to anything happening here," she said.
"So she's not going to jeopardise that to slap up replica Endeavours without consultation."
She said the iwi was still waiting to have an already completed statue of their chief Ruapani installed in their rohe too.
"The site that it's been proposed to be installed in was found to have contaminants. The council has been required to clean up that site," she said.
"Ruapani has been waiting for nearly the last 12 months to go up. Ruapani has more significance in this place than the Endeavour will ever have."
Endeavour replica arriving in Tūranganui-a-Kiwa (Poverty Bay) last year. Photo: Gray Clapham