June 11, 2021
Coster substitutes not good enough for party
Māori Party MPs feel they are being fobbed off by police over their concerns about white supremacist terrorism.
Co-leader Rawiri Waititi says they called for the meeting because of what seemed to be a slow police response to a social media video threatening to burn down marae and kill Māori leaders.
He says they were promised a sit-down with Police Commissioner Andy Coster, not with the two lower-ranked officers who turned up at party HQ.
"We've been asking questions of the Minister for Police she couldn't answer and it was always deflected to 'those are operational matters.' We wanted to ensure if the taskforce we are pushing for with SIS and Police was committed to people who make those decisions right up the top starting with the commissioner. We were pretty disappointed he didn't show up so we could have that frank and open conversation," Mr Waititi says.
He and co-leader Debbie Ngarewa Packer are continuing to talk to police.
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