A petition fronted by two Otorohanga College pupils calling for a ‘national day' to remember 19th century ‘Land Wars' has been successful. Government has agreed to this without any knowledge of whether the general public wanted it or whether the historical facts for the request were accurate.

Maori fought ‘alongside' government and ‘against' government and much of what happened can be better described as tribal rebellions rather than land wars.

The more important petition to Minister of Archives Peter Dunne, concerning the legitimacy of what is known as the ‘official English' version of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, has been refused. He chooses to ignore the incontrovertible evidence which has been researched from Archives NZ, museums, microfilm, handwriting experts and historians that has been supplied to him. Clearly, Minister Dunne is ‘under the thumb' of tribal activists and has been directed, explicitly or otherwise to ‘refuse' this historically important request.

MJ Anderson, Pyes Pa.