Start with what the deed actually created
The 1932 deed calls the people in clause 7 representative members of the Board. Their capacities include family relationships, geographic populations and one national statesman position. The Board's legal purpose is administration of the Waitangi trust estate.
Clause 7 names eight representative members. The first seven are the grouping this research originally isolated because their descriptions are family, territorial or population-based. That grouping remains useful for investigation, but it is not a statutory class called “the seven”.
The deed proves representation. It does not, by itself, prove succession to sovereign jurisdiction.
Why the connection still matters
One original office was held by Riri Maihi Kawiti as a person chosen from the Hōne Heke, Maihi Kawiti, Tāmati Wāka Nene and Pōmare families. Another was held by Te Rata Mahuta for Māori living in the North Island south of Auckland. Those names and lines intersect directly with the wider He Wakaputanga, Te Tiriti and Kīngitanga history we have been tracing.
That makes the Board architecture constitutionally interesting. It does not permit us to skip the vesting step.
Connection
A representative may descend from, represent a family associated with, or occupy a position connected to a rangatira who exercised political authority.
Vesting
To prove the office itself carries that older authority, we need a source showing the authority was delegated, transferred, recognised as continuing in, or otherwise vested in that office.
Parliament's later amendments sharpen the problem
The statutory structure did not remain frozen. In 1958 a representative of the James Busby family was added. In 2015 Parliament legislated that the position first held by Riri Maihi Kawiti would end and be disestablished, and that the Board must appoint four separate family representatives: Hōne Heke, Maihi Kawiti, Tāmati Wāka Nene and Pōmare.
The 2015 Act also sets terms and eligibility rules for representative members, while the current deed provides for two nominated members of Parliament.
What would prove inheritance of jurisdiction?
At least one of the following kinds of evidence would be required before this series could responsibly say the Board's representative positions carry He Wakaputanga jurisdiction:
- A deed, declaration, compact or resolution from the relevant rangatira or hapū vesting political authority in the office or Board.
- A succession instrument expressly identifying the office as successor to a constitutional role rather than merely a representative trust position.
- Contemporaneous 1932 correspondence stating that the Board was intended to preserve or exercise He Wakaputanga governmental jurisdiction.
- Hapū or whakapapa-based mandate records showing the relevant communities authorised the Board member to exercise political, not merely trust, authority.
- A statute or judicial instrument recognising the Board's authority as independent or co-ordinate jurisdiction rather than statutory trust administration.
No such instrument has yet been located in the material reviewed for this series.
The modern Māori electorates are not these offices
The Māori Representation Act 1867 created four Māori parliamentary members and expressly described the represented population as “Her Majesty's subjects of the Native race”. The modern number of Māori electorates became seven only in 2002 under the later population formula.
Those parliamentary electorates therefore have a different genealogy from the 1932 trust positions. One arose as representation inside Parliament; the other arose as representation inside a statutory trust board.
There is no evidential basis at this stage for saying the seven Māori electorates are the same seven offices, successors to them, or the mechanism by which their supposed authority entered Parliament.
The crux of the investigation
The correct question is now narrower and stronger:
This does not prove that the 1932 Board concealed sovereign authority, and it does not prove that present office-holders are usurpers. Those are allegations requiring evidence about knowledge, mandate, duty and conduct. What the record does justify is a deeper succession audit: appointment by appointment, office by office, asking what each person was authorised to represent and what legal powers attached to that representation.
Why Matike Mai makes this urgent
Matike Mai now proposes a future constitutional structure built around rangatiratanga, kāwanatanga and a relational sphere. Te Pāti Māori's 1 September 2026 policy proposes substantial public funding for the next stage.
Before any new institution is treated as the voice or constitutional successor of hapū and rangatira, the same mandate test should apply there too. A new representative architecture cannot answer the old jurisdiction question merely by using the words “rangatiratanga”, “iwi” or “Māori”.
Primary sources
Waitangi National Trust Board Act 1932 — current version and Schedule 1 deed ↗
Waitangi National Trust Board Amendment Act 2015 ↗
Māori Representation Act 1867 ↗
Matike Mai Aotearoa — findings and constitutional models ↗