United Tribes of New Zealand

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Flag of the United Tribes of New Zealand, New Zealand's first flag, selected in 1834

The United Tribes of New Zealand was a loose confederation of Māori tribes based in the north of the North Island. The confederation was convened in 1834 by James Busby.

Busby was sent to New Zealand in 1833 by the Colonial Office to serve as the official British Resident, and was anxious to set up a framework for trade between Maori and Europeans, the Māori chiefs of northern part of the North Island agreed to meet with him in March of 1834. Discussions were initiated on the creation of a new federal state in New Zealand, and the United Tribes declared their new independence on 28 October of 1835^[1], when rumors began spreading that Baron Charles de Thierry, a French landowner, was going to set up an independent state at Hokianga in order to bring in the French. Busby's efforts were entirely too successful — as the islands settled down, the British began to consider an outright annexation. In February 1840, a number of chiefs of the United Tribes convened at Waitangi to sign the Treaty of Waitangi^{[citation needed]}.

Recently (2007), Sydney-based Maori academic, Brent Kerehona, questioned whether the Ngapuhi chief Moka 'Kainga-mataa' did in fact sign the treaty, as has been claimed by historians and academics of the past. Moka was an ORIGINAL signatory to the Declaration of Independence on October 28, 1835, the SOLE Maori signatory to Hobson's Proclamations on January 30, 1840 (only 7 days prior to the Treaty signing) and voiced his concerns about the Treaty's effects whilst he was at the Treaty meeting on February 5, 1840. Kerehona infers that despite his name appearing on the Treaty of Waitangi, there is no accompanying mark or signature; and that the conversation on February 5, between Moka, the Reverend Charles Baker and Captain William Hobson recorded by William Colenso (1890) should also be considered.