Taniwha

Taniwha are supernatural beings in Māori tradition, often guardians of water, whose forms vary between tribal traditions. In 2002 Ngāti Naho's objection on behalf of a taniwha led Transit New Zealand to reroute part of a Waikato highway.

Te Ara: the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, in an entry by Basil Keane, says taniwha are beings of the supernatural whose form and nature differ from one tribal tradition to another. Māori saw them as belonging to the natural world. Some describe them as monsters of deep water, others as dragons, and many looked like reptiles, were winged and fed on people. Taniwha could also take the form of a shark, whale, octopus or log, and some moved between shapes.

In a 2021 speech published on the government's Beehive website, Nanaia Mahuta said taniwha are native to Aotearoa, with whakapapa that reaches across the Pacific, Te Moana nui a Kiwa. She described them as guardians, often of water, with authority over rivers, seas and land, and as spiritual beings that stand for guardianship of the people and the land.

The sources give differing accounts of a 2002 road dispute. Te Ara says Ngāti Naho, a Waikato hapū, opposed a highway that would have destroyed the home of Karutahi, one of their taniwha, and that Transit New Zealand in the end agreed to reroute part of it. TVNZ One News reported in November 2002 that Transit New Zealand had negotiated an agreement with Ngāti Naho so it could keep developing one of the country's busiest stretches of road. Wikipedia calls Ngāti Naho an iwi from the Meremere district and the road State Highway 1. It says the taniwha was said to look like a large white eel, and that Ngāti Naho argued it had to leave of its own accord, since removing it would invite trouble.