May Day Celebrations in Wellington

May Day 2005 was celebrated in Wellington with a noisy street parade, stalls, activist workshops and the Freedom Shop's tenth birthday party.

May Day celebrations in Wellington began in Midland Park at 2 pm where a substantial anarchist contingent (half of them masked up) and smaller numbers of unionists and other leftist organisations gathered. The weather was fine and the turnout was larger than the year before – about 250 people.

There were many black, black & purple and black & red flags, a large group of costumed anarchafeminists, ten drummers, two Mayor Prenderghasts (at least one of them an impersonator) and a two-metre high cardboard Beehive with NZ flag and dollar sign on top, carried by ‘slaves’ urged on by capitalist slavedrivers. In attendance were about ten police with one police car in front and another following the march. They were well behaved throughout and there were no arrests.

It was good to see a lot of small children on the march, evidence of the increasing number of young anarchist families in Wellington.

After some short speeches, including one from John Anderson about state-sponsored and Mobil-assisted terrorism in Aceh, the march headed off at 2.30 pm along Lambton Quay, Willis Street, past the civic centre and up the entire length of Cuba Street. Leaflets explaining May Day were handed out to onlookers. A large number of addicted consumers shopping on the sabbath day were witness to the noisy anti-capitalist carnival parade.

There were some stops and brief speeches en route, one outside the ANZ (profiting from the Iraq occupation) and another near Rebel Sports (selling goods from sweatshops). An Australian unionist played ballads through a megaphone.

The march finished outside Thistle Hall where the street was blocked for half an hour. Anarchists demolished the cardboard Beehive by jumping on it. At this point the police moved closer in a vain attempt to save the seat of ‘democracy’. They later impounded the ruins.

Participants adjourned to Thistle Hall, where there was a creche, Food Not Bombs supplied hot food and drinks, and people could browse stalls run by the Freedom Shop, unions, Anti-Capitalist Alliance, Peace Action Wellington and Growing Concern.

Three activist workshops ran from 4.30 to 8 pm. The workshop about dealing with police was popular, lasting two hours instead of the scheduled one hour.

The Freedom Shop tenth birthday party from 7.30 to 10 pm rounded off the weekend and featured acoustic music performances, fruit punch and the Freedom Shop stall.