New Zealand buries Maori queen,celebrate new king

Wellington, Aug 21: Tens of thousands of New Zealanders gathered today to bury the Maori queen, one of the country's most respected indigenous leaders, and celebrate the inauguration of her son as her successor.

The tribal home of Dame Te Atairangikaahu, who died of kidney failure last Tuesday, aged 75, was overflowing as Maori of many tribes, New Zealand and Pacific political leaders, and many others of different races attended her funeral ceremony.

Before the start of the service Dame Te Ata's eldest son, Tuheitia Paki, was invested as the seventh leader of the Maori King Movement.

The movement was founded and has been based in the Waikato region in the central North Island, but leaders from Maori tribes throughout New Zealand were consulted on the succession.

Moments before Paki's crowning, the crowd was asked if he should be king, to which they answered with a resounding ''Ae'' (yes).

Wearing a feather cloak, he sat on an elaborately carved wooden throne beside his mother's coffin.

Messages of condolence from Britain's Queen Elizabeth, New Zealand's titular head of state, and her son Prince Charles were read to the service.

''Dame Te Ata gave a lifetime of service and dedication,'' said the queen in her message. ''Her leadership, dignity and compassion will long be remembered.'' Three white doves symbolising the spirit of the Maori queen were released just before her casket, draped in an historic woven mat and adorned by a bird carved from jade, was carried to a large canoe, which took her up the Waikato River to her tribe's sacred burial mountain.

Thousands of people lined both sides of the river for the journey of around 15 km . Spontaneous songs and dances of respect broke out as the canoe passed.

Her coffin was carried shoulder high by bare-chested warriors through throngs of mourners to the mountain, where the previous five leaders have been buried.

The Maori monarchy has no formal constitutional or legal role in New Zealand, but the position carries considerable prestige.

An estimated 100,000 people filed past her coffin during the six days it was laid in state at her tribe's main meeting place at Ngaruawahia, about 100 km south of Auckland. Over the past week flags have flown at half mast on official buildings and the national rugby team, the All Blacks, wore black armbands and observed a minute's silence before Saturday's match against Australia.

The King Movement was established in the late 1850s by Maori in the Waikato region in response to land losses to European settlers and to negotiate with the then colonial government.

Maori make up about 15 per cent of the population of 4.1 million people of the small South Pacific nation.

BABY TWINS DIE AFTER ABUSE

Tiny Chris and Cru Kahui lived in a squalid south Auckland house shared by 10 adults, including their mother, Macsyna King. King had been away overnight and took them to hospital when she returned, complaining that the twins were not feeding. Medical examinations found they were brain dead after suffering severe head and other injuries. They were placed on life support but the machines were turned off five days later.

Nine adults were in the house at the time the infants suffered their injuries, many of them found to be drunk. Yet the twins' Maori family has refused to cooperate with police and a painstaking investigation is still under way.

Amid nationwide soul-searching, Prime Minister Helen Clark described them as a '''Once Were Warriors''' type family'' - a reference to the harrowing 1994 movie, based on an Alan Duff novel, about urban dislocation and violence in a poor Maori family.

Clouding the domestic violence epidemic is the over-representation of indigenous Maori, proud descendants of a warrior race who make up 15 per cent of the population.

Government figures show that Maori children under 5 years old are being admitted to hospital with ''intentional injury'' at twice the rate of other children.

The deaths of the Kahui twins prompted a week-long series of articles in the New Zealand Herald newspaper under the title ''Warriors Still''.

It cited studies which show disillusionment, poverty, unemployment, alcohol and drug abuse contribute to the over-representation of Maori in domestic violence figures - patterns repeated in indigenous communities around the world.

Some Maori leaders say they have heard it all before and warn against assigning racial or cultural stereotypes.

''I remember 30 or 40 years ago when I was a kid people said Maori had a natural inclination to play the guitar, that Maori had a natural inclination to play rugby, Maori were good on bulldozers,'' Maori lawmaker Hone Harawira said.

''I've stopped listening to that sort of carry on,'' he said.

Others like Rankin say the problem is too big and too urgent to become bogged down in a cross-cultural slanging match.

''With the deaths of the Kahui twins I came out and said Maori have got a real problem in New Zealand,'' she said.

''A lot of people came up and said thank you for saying it, while others came out and said it was racist. It is not racist.'' ''It is a fact and we have got to find a way to address it and manage this,'' Rankin said.

Reuters