Joy for landowners locked out for 120 years

Owners of the Koputara Block near Foxton will, for the first time in 120 years, realize their dream of legally accessing their land. They will be celebrating the historical event by having karakia and holding a tree-planting day.

Members of five Ngāti Raukawa iwi/hapū (Ngāti Parewahawaha, Ngāti Turanga, Ngāti Tukorehe, Ngāti Kikopiri and Ngāti Pareraukawa) and affiliated groups are invited to the historical event to be held on Saturday 30 April 2016. They will gather at 503 Wylie Road, Foxton.

Koputara Trust trustee Pataka Moore said the owners will be making a statement by “walking the court-ordered right of way and planting trees on the edge of the wetland/lake.”

Mr Moore said the owners had battled for many years to get access to the block, which is land-locked by a strip of land about 10 metres wide running around the block.

This strip prevented access to their land up until 1999 when they gained a judgement from the Māori Land Court giving them a right-of-way.

“The strip-of-land was designed to alienate us from our land by the adjoining
owner. For the last 17 years the trust has been fiercely trying to form that right-of-way and have only recently been successful.”

Mr Moore said Koputara was set aside as a reserve for their people in the 1870s and successive governments failed to make good their promise of providing access.

“The land included part of Lake Koputara and stream and approximately 345 acres. In 1873 the eastern-most land surrounding Koputara was sold to Mr Francis Robinson and the rest was left as Crown Land. This was supposed to have roads provided and access formed. This never occurred.”

In 1890 the Crown sold their land to the Whanganui-Manawatū Railway Company and again the promised access never materialised.

A Mr Dalrymple acquired the large block and 1957 sold it to Mr B Sexton. He in turn surveyed a strip around the block to encase it in his lands and sold the balance to P.N. Lomas in 1963.

The block is subject to a Waitangi Tribunal claim and in 1999 the owners were successful in getting a court judgement giving them access. For various reasons the trustees have only just been successful in getting a right-of-way surveyed and formed.

Mr Moore who has a background in environmental management said various drainage schemes over the last century have resulted in very little lake remaining and the Koputara Trust had recently applied for resource consent to re-establish the lake “This is a major environmental restoration project and we hope it will result in major biodiversity benefits to our whenua and people. One of the trustees, Pat Seymour, is working with Horizons Regional Council and contractors to ensure this happens.”

“We hope to have open water on our whenua this winter.”

Mr Moore said they were encouraging iwi members and affiliated groups to be involved in the project and come plant a tree.

“We will provide all of the trees and materials so bring your gumboots, raincoat and spade.”

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