The protester who flung a dildo at Steven Joyce at Waitangi three years ago is back there on the eve of Waitangi Day despite a trespass order, but says this time she only wants to explore her ancestry at the site.
The activist, Christchurch nurse Josie Butler, has been invited to speak at the forum tent on the lower marae, Te Tii Marae, but the upper marae is out of bounds to her.
Today she spoke to TVNZ1's Seven Sharp at Waitangi, explaining what was behind her 2016 dildo-throwing protest that made headlines around the world, the trespass order she's received and her new-found connection to Te Tii Marae.
Ms Butler said she decided to throw the sex toy at then Economic Development minister Steven Joyce out of sheer frustration that her three-and-a-half years of campaigning against the TPP trade deal had not worked.
"And so I Googled 'most effective forms of protest'. And it came up with the guy who threw his shoes at George Bush to protest the Iraq war.
"And I was like, okay throwing things, that works really well. And we chose the one that Steven Joyce got purely because it was actually a dog's squeaky toy to avoid hurting anybody, but just to make a bit of a statement."
“I can understand maybe the rationale as to why they'd trespass me
Ms Butler said her trespass notice came from the Waitangi Trust CEO Greg McManus, who told her police had requested it.
"And I can understand maybe the rationale as to why they'd trespass me. But it just would have been really nice to have a conversation around that, and someone to maybe give me a call first, give me a heads up," she said.
"I've tried really hard to have conversations with whoever it has come from, so I can put forward my perspective and we can have a discussion around it. But nobody will respond to me, nobody will talk to me.
"And when people have approached Greg McManus who the trespass notice is from, he's the CEO of the Waitangi Trust, he said that he was acting on the interests of the police and police had requested that notice."
“I recently discovered my great great great grandfather was chief of Te Tii.
What makes it a hard pill to swallow is Ms Butler's new-found connection to the marae.
"I recently discovered my great great great grandfather was chief of Te Tii. And he was a signatory of Tiriti o Waitangi (Treaty of Waitangi). He was the first person ever to speak on Waitangi in 1840," she said.
"I'm just coming up here to explore my whakapapa and I made that very clear on my communications with the board. But nobody has even acknowledged my messages. That is kind of hurtful."
She's allowed to go as far as the bridge at Waitangi but said if she crosses it, "I think I get arrested."
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