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Police speak to man sought in relation to Greymouth assault

Police speak to man sought in relation to Greymouth assault

Police say they are now speaking to the man sought in relation to an assault in Greymouth. They earlier launched a public appeal relating to an incident at a restaurant on August 8. A police spokesman said the man “may be able to assist us with our inquiries following an assault on the corner of Tainui and Whall Streets” on Friday. The alleged assault happened at about 10.45pm. Police did not know where the man was from, but said it was possibly Christchurch or Nelson. Police asked anyone with information to reference file number 250811/6119. Information can also be offered anonymously via Crime Stoppers on 0800 555 111. Raphael Franks is an Auckland-based reporter who covers business, breaking news and local stories from Tāmaki Makaurau. He joined the Herald as a Te Rito cadet in 2022.

Manawatū police target anti-social drivers, impound seven cars

Manawatū police target anti-social drivers, impound seven cars

A major police operation in Manawatū overnight resulted in dozens of infringements with hundreds of motorists stopped – including three arrests and seven cars impounded. Among those arrested was a 28-year-old who allegedly threw a bottle at a police vehicle. Operation Purple called in staff from Whanganui, Taranaki, Wellington and Hawke’s Bay. At least 250 drivers were breath-tested, with four people showing excess breath alcohol. The police activities largely took place in central Palmerston North and its rural surrounds, including Feilding. Manawatū Area Prevention Manager, Inspector Ash Gurney, said the police have zero tolerance for anti-social road-user behaviour. “We got in early; we were highly visible from the start with patrols, checkpoints and vehicle stops, which made sure that the groups were not able to form in numbers,” Gurney said. Fifty-eight infringements were issued, with nine vehicles either pink-, blue- or green-stickered. “I’m really pleased with the outcome of this operation, especially when we see the devastating impacts that can occur from anti-social road-user behaviour,” Gurney said.

Indonesia protest blaze kills three as anger erupts over driver's death

Indonesia protest blaze kills three as anger erupts over driver's death

Protests rocking Southeast Asia’s biggest economy continued at the weekend with a deadly fire. The blaze started by protesters at a council building in eastern Indonesia killed at least three people, a local official said. Major cities, including Jakarta, have been hit by protests since Friday after the death of Affan Kurniawan, 21, hit by a police vehicle. Footage spread of the motorcycle taxi driver being run over by a police tactical vehicle during an earlier rally against low wages and financial perks for lawmakers. The protests are the biggest and most violent of Prabowo Subianto’s presidency, a key test for the ex-general less than a year into his rule. Protests in Makassar, the biggest city on the eastern island of Sulawesi, descended into chaos outside the provincial and city council buildings, which were both set on fire as demonstrators hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails. Three people were killed as a result of the Makassar city council fire, its secretary Rahmat Mappatoba told AFP. “They were trapped in the burning building,” he said, accusing protesters of lighting the blaze. “Usually during a demonstration, protesters only throw rocks or burn a tyre in front of the office. They never stormed into the building or burned it.” Two workers died at the scene and a third person, a civil servant, died in hospital. At least four people were injured in the fire and were being treated in hospital, Rahmat said. Hundreds of people were seen in footage posted by Indonesian media cheering and clapping as fire engulfed the building, with few security forces in sight. One man was heard shouting: “There are people upstairs!” Smouldering debris was seen falling from the roof of the city council building surrounded by palm trees as flames still flickered in charred cars. Protesters inside lit several fires as parts of the building collapsed, while others smashed glass and chanted “revolution”. The building was a blackened wreck on Saturday, with dozens of charred cars around it, as Makassar residents inspected the scene, media footage showed. Windiyatno, South Sulawesi’s military chief, said that the situation in Makassar had “now returned to normal”. ‘Police crimes’ Protesters gathered again on Saturday in different areas of Indonesia’s vast archipelago. Hundreds of students and “ojek” motorcycle taxi drivers protested in front of the police headquarters in Bali, Indonesia’s most popular tourist hotspot. Protesters on neighbouring Lombok Island stormed a council building in the provincial capital Mataram and set it on fire, despite police attempts to stop them with tear gas. Hundreds of students in Surabaya also rallied outside the East Java police headquarters, according to an AFP journalist at the scene. In response to the protests, social media app TikTok said it had temporarily suspended its live feature for “a few days” in Indonesia, where it has more than 100 million users. In Jakarta, hundreds had massed on Friday outside the headquarters of the elite Mobile Brigade Corp (Brimob) paramilitary police unit they blamed for Kurniawan’s death the day before. Protesters threw firecrackers as police responded with tear gas. Police said they had detained seven officers for questioning in connection with Affan’s death. National police chief Listyo Sigit Prabowo, who is not related to the president, told a news conference the officers would face an ethics trial that could take a week. “If they are guilty, there’s room for us to process the case as a crime,” he said. President Prabowo has urged calm and ordered an investigation into the driver’s death and that the officers involved be held accountable. On Saturday he cancelled a planned trip to China for a military parade commemorating the end of World War II in order to monitor the situation in Indonesia. “Mr President apologised because he decided he could not accept the invitation from the Chinese Government,” State Secretary Prasetyo Hadi said. Prabowo has pledged fast, sta...

'She was just wailing': Friends had to tell RSE worker's mum he had been killed in a crash

'She was just wailing': Friends had to tell RSE worker's mum he had been killed in a crash

Kaiea Taubakoa arrived in New Zealand last year from the small Pacific nation of Kiribati to tend orchards and vineyards. It was his second season enduring a cold winter as his family’s sole breadwinner. But he never returned to them. The shy 37-year-old, who never said much but was always smiling and laughing, was killed in a midwinter road crash on SH1 near Blenheim last year, leaving behind a 9-year-old son. Truck driver Robert Wayne Clifford was on his phone and travelling at more than 70km/h when he smashed into the rear of the van carrying Taubakoa and other RSE workers. There was no indication he even braked, the police summary of facts said. The impact shunted the van about 160m, killing Taubakoa instantly and injuring five others, some badly. Clifford, 54, already had four infringements for using a cellphone while driving, three while driving a truck. The scene of the crash on State Highway 1 in Marlborough, where RSE worker Kaiea Taubakoa was killed in June 2024, after a truck ploughed into the back of the van he was in. Photo / William Woodworth He recently pleaded guilty in the Blenheim District Court to dangerous driving causing death and five charges of dangerous driving causing injury to workers Mafi Kitiona, Tamuera Teawaki, Iotebwa Kautunamakin, Nakaiea Raiwan and Toomi Taniiti. Clifford’s name suppression has now lapsed. Mum was devastated by the news The workers had arrived in the country three months earlier under the Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme. The crash on a stretch of SH1 near Grovetown, Blenheim, happened a week after they had moved from the North Island kiwifruit orchards to prune winter grapevines in Marlborough. Friend and support advocate for the RSE workers, Tokanang Harrison, told NZME Taubakoa’s mother in Kiribati was devastated by the news. “It’s difficult contacting people back home. They can’t always get to a phone, like, you can’t just ring them.” The community in Blenheim finally made contact and heard her break down. “She was talking on the phone, and they put her on the speaker, and she was ... just broken. She wasn’t angry, she was just broken. “She was just wailing and wailing and we all felt so bad. It’s so hard for families when they send them [workers] away, and then something like this happens.” Harrison, a cousin of Taubakoa’s partner, described him as having been a happy person who never said much, but who laughed a lot. “He was always smiling and laughing, that’s all he did. He never said much. You’d try to talk to him, and he went, ‘Oh, yeah’, and then laughed,” Harrison said. Taubakoa was farewelled in a “moving service” conducted by St Christopher’s Anglican Church in Blenheim, before his body was sent home to Kiribati. The farewell service in Blenheim for RSE worker Kaiea Taubakoa. Photo / Supplied. Seconds separated truck and van According to a summary of facts, rain had fallen overnight in Marlborough and a chill wind was blowing on the morning of June 20 last year. The roads were wet at 6.31am as the crew got into their van, driven by Kitiona, to start work in a Grovetown vineyard. Minutes before, Clifford drove his truck out of a yard south of Blenheim bound for a site in Queen Charlotte Drive, in the Marlborough Sounds. The GPS tracking device in the truck showed his movements through the Blenheim residential area on SH1. At 6.32am the van was seen on CCTV driving north on Grove Rd. Clifford’s truck was about 200m behind. As the vehicles approached a bridge, where the speed limit changed soon after from 50km/h to 100km/h, just 18 seconds separated the two vehicles. The van, with its headlights and taillights on, continued along the well-lit road for about 300m before slowing down and indicating right on to Lower Wairau Rd. It stopped near the centreline and waited for oncoming traffic before turning. Police said two cars slowed to pass the van on the left-hand shoulder of the road. Clifford, who had used his cellphone to activate Spotify and make...

Labour fixes embarrassing error as it challenges Govt to 'be honest' about RBNZ saga

Labour fixes embarrassing error as it challenges Govt to 'be honest' about RBNZ saga

Labour’s finance spokeswoman Barbara Edmonds has admitted to making a fundamental mistake as she attacked Finance Minister Nicola Willis for her handling of controversy at the Reserve Bank. Responding to news Reserve Bank chairman Neil Quigley quit late in the day on Friday, Edmonds incorrectly said in a Facebook post that Quigley had also been a member of the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee. The committee plays an essential role in the economy, as it is tasked with keeping inflation in check. It sets the Official Cash Rate (OCR) and initiated the Reserve Bank’s Covid-era money printing programme, shortly after it was established under the Labour-led Government in 2019. Edmonds was embarrassed when the Herald alerted her to the blunder on Saturday morning. She clarified it was a genuine slip-up, as she did in fact know that Quigley wasn’t a member of the powerful committee that sets the OCR. She corrected the mistake, which wasn’t picked up by her staff and colleagues. ‘It’s time for Nicola Willis to be honest’ The point of Edmonds’ Facebook post was to call out Willis for being cagey over the circumstances around Adrian Orr’s sudden resignation as Reserve Bank Governor in March. It took Treasury releasing documents the Reserve Bank wanted withheld, as well as intervention from the Ombudsman, for the Reserve Bank to provide a more detailed version of events on Thursday, which told quite a different story to that presented six months prior. “It’s time for Nicola Willis to be honest with the public about what she knows, what she has been told about the situation and when. What actions has she taken to manage the situation?” Edmonds said. When pushed by Newstalk ZB on Friday night, Willis admitted she knew key details about Orr’s resignation, which were kept quiet until Thursday. She acknowledged she knew Orr had stepped down as governor a week before his resignation, as the board raised a series of concerns with him. In March, Quigley refused to elaborate on why Orr resigned, only to say it was a “personal decision”. Then in June, the Reserve Bank explained the issue was that Orr disagreed with the board over the amount of government funding to pitch for. Willis reiterated she didn’t want to get involved in a legalistic employment issue between Orr and the board and wanted to respect the Reserve Bank’s independence from the Government. However, she took the opportunity to tell Newstalk ZB listeners she would have asked Quigley to resign, had he not done so himself on Friday. She also noted she met with Quigley shortly before he resigned, telling him the handling of Orr’s resignation was impacting the Reserve Bank’s reputation. The press release Willis issued to announce Quigley’s resignation made no mention of this or the Ombudsman compelling the Reserve Bank to be more transparent. Rather, it said, “Mr Quigley has decided that having overseen a number of key workstreams for the bank, now is the appropriate time to hand over to a new chair”. Quigley and Orr have been contacted for comment. Jenée Tibshraeny is the Herald’s Wellington business editor, based in the parliamentary press gallery. She specialises in government and Reserve Bank policymaking, economics and banking.