Brian Tamaki’s ‘People’s Court’ attracted a lot of attention, both positive and negative. The media’s response was either blissful ignorance or to downplay the amount of support for it. The police responded by putting bollards up around the gates (which they locked) and barriers around the Parliament grounds. They also had security guards around the entrance. However, they did close some of the roads in order to stop vehicles from entering the vicinity. It seemed clear that the police were determined not to repeat the events of the Freedom Convoy back in February.
The pro-government elements had finally got themselves organised, with a ‘FARC off Brian Tamaki’ counter-protest by the group Poneke Anti-Fascist Coalition with support from A Coalition Against Freedom and Rights Coalition. The group boasts ‘video essayist’ Byron Clarke and ‘queer activist’ Dudley Benson.
The freedom movement is now gaining international attention culminating in the announcement that Avi Yemeni and Rukshan Fernando were planning to head to Wellington to cover the protests. However, our immigration department who had let in the New Lynn Attacker and the Christchurch shooter, blocked Avi for ‘extremism’. Something our media, which had previously defended an ISIS fighter’s attempts to return to New Zealand, celebrated.
Their reason was the mainstream media’s claims of Avi being a far-right extremist who they quoted as saying he was “Australia’s proudest Jewish Nazi”. Considering this comment was obviously sarcastic, it’s evident that our media has a selective sense of humour; the same media which defended Rawiri Waititi for jokingly suggesting he would poison David Seymour.
Around the same time, lots of other things happened starting with the banning of Chantelle Baker from Facebook and Counterspin from Instagram. Next, flights to Wellington from around the country were cancelled. Then the Interislander suddenly announced the closure of their services due to ‘emergency repairs’.
The night before the protest, I walked to Parliament to have a look around. The police had already closed the roads around Parliament, specifically focusing on the ones previously occupied such as Molesworth Street and Lambton Quay. They put bollards around the gates that they had locked. On Parliament grounds there were barriers around the place, specifically near the steps. One car drove into Molesworth Street prompting a police car to follow them and escort them out.
Some of the protesters had planned to go to the Botanical Gardens where a drone was to be used to take an aerial photo of them making a heart with torches. After that, there was to be dinner and drinks at a local pub near Parliament. However, more ‘coincidences’ happened.
First, the original venue cancelled the booking forcing the protesters to book another bar; however, when we went to that venue, the venue locked the doors and told us to leave as they were ‘not accepting walk-ins and only bookings’. However, we were welcomed into the local watering hole for politicians.
There were a variety of people there, from Billy TK supporters to VFF local body infiltrators to Marsden Point people. The person who had organised this was a nurse who had been mandated out of their job. When I told some people who I was, someone asked me if I was a journalist, which drew suspicious stares from another person. The person who asked me went into how the media had destroyed their life after they had run for local body elections.
The atmosphere was abuzz with excitement about the big day. When we left the pub some stayed to reminisce about Freedom Village. There were some jokes made about ‘how nice it would be to put some tents here’. I met someone there who was producing a documentary soon to be released. Also present was someone who contributed to the upcoming ‘River of Freedom’ documentary.
I finished off the night touring around with one of the independent filmmakers doing a quick livestream as they showed what parliament security had done to prepare for the protest. We said a quick hello to the security guards and I promised that it would not be an occupation. It’s good to see that my promise was kept.
