Protesters in Wellington have been served with a trespass notice giving them seven days to leave the planned development site at Shelly Bay.
Port Nicholson Block Settlement Trust served the eviction notice on a group named Mau Whenua, which has long opposed the development. But iwi say it is time to move on.
After the many issues that have plagued the Port Nicholson Block Settlement Trust over many years, including having to sell land at Shelly Bay, the trust believes its best days are ahead of it, and its chief executive, Lee Hunt, agrees.
"So we've come from 10 years, a real rubbish period in our history. We've had the past four years of breaking even and making some money for a change."
"We will become a landlord. We will have commercial realities that will hit that will help our bottom line, which will help drive some of those outcomes, those positive outcomes."
But not everyone from the iwi is supportive. Today papers were served to those occupying land, and according to Mau Whenua's Shamia Makarini, there is no mana in those papers. She says the trust is not working in the best interests of the iwi.
"Our reaction is probably sadness, disappointment but not surprise.
"I don't believe there has any legal basis, nor do I believe that actually has any basis in tikanga Māori," she says.
According to Lee, despite those who object, the iwi believes this is the way forward.
"It comes from our marae, our rūnanga o Te Ātiawa and from the trust itself, And it came from Shelly Bay Ltd, which is the commercial entity for Shelly Bay."
A former member of the Mau Whenua movement says it’s time for the protestors to quit their occupation of Shelly Bay/Marukaikuru and allow developers to get on with building houses.
Paora Mepham was among the first people to join the Mau Whenua occupation of Shelly Bay a year ago to protest the sale of the land to The Wellington Company by the Port Nicholson Block Settlement Trust – the post-Treaty settlement entity for Taranaki Whānui.
“We put our pou in the ground and began an occupation to prevent any further alienation of our whenua until we knew what was going on,” Mr Mepham says