There are some patently false claims in the letter by Gloria McIsaac.
Early recorded history shows that Maori rarely solved any conflict by Hui, although Missionaries strived hugely to encourage this (largely foreign) concept of discussion and compromise that forms the basis of modern Hui. The Maori tradition of Utu meant that territorial disputes revolved around ceaseless invasion and slaughter and had done for centuries before European arrival. The major difference once Europeans turned up was that Maori were able to vastly increase their killing power by use of muskets. Faced with the increasing death toll, it is a recorded fact that many Maori were a driving force behind the treaty which they viewed as providing them with protection from other tribes. To try to claim otherwise is to falsify our history.
The idea of Maori being unique ‘Guardians of the Land' does not stack up when it is remembered that pre-European Maori hunted many abundant animals to extinction in a short period of time such as Moa and the Haast Eagle and repeatedly burned off forever the massive South Island alpine forests. Maori verbal history records tribes exhausting areas of their resources and then moving on to repeat this process elsewhere. Resources were, as is the case everywhere in the world, a driving force of inter-tribal conflict.
I will get in before the apologists and add that I am not claiming other races are necessarily any better, rather that all people have similar potential and abilities of conflict and harmony, of exploitation and of conservation and to pretend otherwise is to do everyone in our country a great disservice.
Mike Kuipers von Lande, Mount Maunganui.