Robert Mahuta (original) (raw)

Sir Robert Te Kotahi Mahuta KNZM (26 April 1939 – 1 February 2001) was a prominent Māori politician. He was born Robert Jeremiah Ormsby and changed his name by deed poll. Mahuta was the first Māori leader to negotiate a satisfactory compensation settlement with the New Zealand government for tribal land confiscated under European settlement in the fledgling colony. In a deal completed in late 1994, he won a package worth NZ$170m for his Tainui tribe for the seizure of 485,000 hectares of land in the North Island's Waikato region 131 years earlier. Significantly for all Māori, the settlement included the first formal apology given by the Crown to the indigenous people for historical wrongs during colonisation.