The Independent Police Conduct Authority will release the findings of its inquiry into police operations during the protest and occupation of Parliament grounds last year on Thursday.
The 23-day protest, which started on January 8 and went until March 2 last year, was led by group opposed the Government’s Covid-19 vaccine mandates but quickly grew to incorporate other fringe and disenfranchised causes. It came to a riotous end when police moved in and ejected the occupiers.
The authority received nearly 2000 complaints regarding police conduct, interviewed more than 350 people and needed an extra month to finish the inquiry.
It asked for $3.5 million to investigate the allegations made from the occupation.
Those interviewed included protesters, police, and other key parties, including former prime minister Jacinda Ardern, former speaker of the house Trevor Mallard, and former Wellington mayor Andy Foster.
The amount of information to analyse was so vast, an additional month was needed to finish the report, Authority chair Judge Colin Doherty said. The report will now be released on Thursday.
Stuff
There’s no way they can admit any of the regime’s handling of this protest was wrong. There might be a token apology for the worst isolated incidents, but that’s all. To say the Police were wrong is to say the government and the media were also wrong (and lying or depicting the protest wrongly). They’re not going to do that. Not in a month of Sundays.
Instead, we will get concern trolled about how difficult the whole situation was, how the Police found walloping old men and women really challenging and we should all feel sorry for them.
What we won’t hear is how many Police have been charged for their callous disregard for safety, wrongful arrest, inappropriate charging of people, and illegally using bricks, firehoses and fire extinguishers against people. Don’t forget the indiscriminate use of pepper spray, gaslighting us into thinking acid was thrown at Police when it was in fact their own pepper spray, and the use of grenade launchers, rubber bullets and tear gas.
We saw them:
Click to view
We saw them again:
Click to view
Unless and until Police are charged for their illegal and dangerous actions then a whitewash report is meaningless.
I’ll be pleasantly surprised, but won’t hold my breath that the IPCA produces a truly independent report that holds Police accountable for their deplorable actions in bringing violence to the streets of Wellington.
Cam Slater is a New Zealand-based blogger, best known for his role in Dirty Politics and publishing the Whale Oil Beef Hooked blog, which operated from 2005 until it closed in 2019. This article was first published HERE
4 comments:
Much like the media has gone quiet on where and why the police were absent during the riot over Posie Parker. I guess for msm to push for answers would need them to look in the mirror and accept their own responsibility.
Just be quiet and move all little sheep.
Demanding the resignations of both Coster and Chambers would be the minimum.
When senior officers become politicised it is time for them to go. Their control over the violence instigated by the police was certainly not something of which they should be proud.
Their job should have been to advise the braindead politicians to meet with the protestors and listen to their concerns. Had they done that from the start the whole situation could have been defused and been over in a day or two.
Their enforcing the mandates of the police is a sign of gutlessness and sycophancy and complete disregard for the welfare of the rank and file.
The lack of response at Albert Park is further evidence of their politicisation when the protestors there(including MPs and bureaucrats) had made obvious their intent to violence and yet police did nothing to prevent assaults. What has been done about those offenders.
If the politicians choose to ignore the unhappy then unhappiness follows.
Cam - is it going to be possible to access the (sworn??) statements of both Ardern & Mallard, along with any Police Officer an/or others- who gave evidence.
The first two are the main concern, especially their answers to questions asked as being evidence given, and "how much of it will be either - [a] - redacted from documents given under OIA, or [2] - suppressed for Political consideration.
The same can be said for others, who gave verbal and/or written evidence.
We have a similar "case", with NZ IPCA as the State Of Victoria/Australia had with an Independent Body seeking answers, from Daniel Andrews (State Premier) re Govt responses to Covid.19 and the fact that no "information/or a report" has been released by that body, following their interviews with Andrews.
Both Andrews & Ardern had equal "parallels" in their Covid management placed on the Population, "they were elected to represent".
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