{"id":67631,"date":"2024-12-06T09:56:46","date_gmt":"2024-12-05T20:56:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/aotearoa\/?p=67631"},"modified":"2025-07-28T21:01:46","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T09:01:46","slug":"on-stopping-seabed-mining-agms-and-bad-guests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/aotearoa\/story\/on-stopping-seabed-mining-agms-and-bad-guests\/","title":{"rendered":"On stopping seabed mining, AGMs and bad guests."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Last week, a bunch of us from the Greenpeace team joined up with our friends from Ng\u0101ti Ruanui, bought a few shares and flew over to Sydney to the offices of Manuka Resources, the owner of Trans-Tasman Resources. Our objective was to attend their Annual General Meeting<\/a> because we had an important message to deliver<\/a> to our fellow shareholders.<\/p>\n\n

Our message was simple, and we had it printed on banners and t-shirts:<\/p>\n\n

NO SEABED MINING<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Although it was a simple message, we felt like we needed to deliver it in person because, for over a decade, the mining company has refused to listen.<\/p>\n\n

What happened<\/h2>\n\n

Trans-Tasman Resources (TTR)<\/a>, a wholly owned subsidiary of Australian mining company Manuka Resources<\/a>, has been trying to push ahead with a terrible project<\/a> to mine 50 million tonnes of sand from the seabed per year of the Taranaki Bight for 35 years. Despite facing opposition from the very start, and despite being rejected by the courts due to their repeated inability to comply with the relevant environmental regulations, TTR has disregarded the wishes of the people that will be most affected by their intended seabed mining operation.<\/p>\n\n

So we decided to communicate directly to them and their shareholders during their AGM. We wrote a friendly letter for the shareholders, which we put in an envelope along with a gift \u201cStop Seabed Mining\u201d sticker.<\/p>\n\n

\"\"
Rukutai Watene and Peeti Wharehoka-Watene of Ng\u0101ti Ruanui, along with six Greenpeace activists interrupted the Sydney AGM of Australian mining company Manuka Resources, the owner of Trans-Tasman Resources, telling shareholders that he and his hap\u016b will continue to resist seabed mining in their rohe.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n

I sat next to Rukutai and Peeti, representatives from Ng\u0101ti Ruanui who travelled over a thousand kilometres from Taranaki to Sydney, while we listened to the chairman starting proceedings with a land acknowledgement to the aboriginal Gadigal people. I could not help but notice how ironic, performative and hollow this acknowledgement felt, coming from the representative of a company that has demonstrated they have no real interest in engaging with the concerns of indigenous people of the lands where they intend to carry out their activities. What they are proposing is indeed a modern  form of colonial extraction.<\/p>\n\n

After a few minutes, we decided the time had come to deliver our message. I sent out a text to activists outside who walked into the office holding printed signs that showed the coast of Taranaki, the precious pygmy whales that live in the area, and the local children holding signs outside an EPA hearing where TTR\u2019s plans were previously rejected. By this point we vastly outnumbered the shareholders at the meeting.<\/p>\n\n

Rukutai stood up and greeted the gathered people. He stated his case for opposing the mining project that threatens to ravage his home, he reminded them how Ng\u0101ti Ruanui have taken their case to court three times, and won all three of them. He spoke with mana and confidence while I stood next to him and the company shareholders, perhaps for the first time, were confronted with someone directly affected by the decisions they take from their offices. This was the moment where the people they usually see as little more lines on a spreadsheet became real to them.<\/p>\n\n

\n