<P> About 50 meetings were held from February to September 1840 to discuss and sign the copies, and a further 500 signatures were added to the Treaty . While most did eventually sign, especially in the far north where most Māori lived, a number of chiefs and some tribal groups ultimately refused, including Pōtatau Te Wherowhero (Waikato iwi), Tuhoe, Te Arawa and Ngāti Tuwharetoa and possibly Moka' Kainga - mataa' . A number of non-signatory Waikato and Central North Island chiefs would later form a kind of confederacy with an elected monarch called the Kīngitanga . (The Kīngitanga Movement would later form a primary anti-government force in the New Zealand Wars .) While copies were moved around the country to give as many tribal leaders as possible the opportunity to sign, some missed out, especially in the South Island, where inclement weather prevented copies from reaching Otago or Stewart Island . Assent to the Treaty was unanimous in Kaitaia, as well as possibly the Wellington to Whanganui region, but there were at least some holdouts in every other part of New Zealand . </P> <P> Nonetheless, on 21 May 1840, Lieutenant - Governor Hobson proclaimed sovereignty over the whole country, (the North Island by Treaty and the South Island and Stewart Island by discovery) and New Zealand was constituted as a colony separate from New South Wales on 16 November 1840 . The British government was told that the North Island had been ceded with "unanimous adherence" (which was not accurate) and while Hobson claimed the South Island by discovery based on the "uncivilised state of the natives", in actuality he had no basis to make such a claim . In reality, Hobson issued the proclamation because he felt it was forced on him by settlers from the New Zealand Company who had attempted to form an independent settlement government at Port Nicholson and claimed legality from local chiefs . Hobson also failed to report to the British government that the Māori version of the Treaty was substantially different from the English one (which he might not have known at the time) and also reported that both versions had received 512 signatures, where in truth the majority of signatures had been on the Māori copies that had been sent around the country, rather than on the single English copy . Basing their decision on this information, on October 2, 1840, the Colonial Office approved Hobson's proclamation . They did not have second thoughts when later reports revealed more detail about the inadequacies of the Treaty negotiations, and they did not take issue with the fact that large areas of the North Island had not signed . The government had never asked for Hobson to obtain unanimous agreement from the indigenous people . </P> <P> In 1841, Treaty documents, housed in an iron box, narrowly escaped damage when the government offices at Official Bay in Auckland were destroyed by fire . They disappeared from sight until 1865 when a Native Department officer worked on them in Wellington at the request of parliament and produced an erroneous list of signatories . The papers were fastened together and then deposited in a safe in the Colonial Secretary's office . </P> <P> In 1877, the English language rough draft of the Treaty was published along with photolithographic facsimiles, and the originals were returned to storage . In 1908, historian and bibliographer Dr Thomas Hocken, searching for historical documents, found the Treaty papers in poor condition, damaged at the edges by water and partly eaten by rodents . The papers were restored by the Dominion Museum in 1913 and kept in special boxes from then on . In February 1940, the Treaty documents were taken to Waitangi for display in the Treaty House during the Centenary celebrations . It was possibly the first time the Treaty document had been on public display since it was signed . After the outbreak of war with Japan, they were placed with other state documents in an outsize luggage trunk and deposited for secure custody with the Public Trustee at Palmerston North by the local MP, who did not tell staff what was in the case . However, as the case was too large to fit in the safe, the Treaty documents spent the war at the side of a back corridor in the Public Trust office . </P>

Why did māori want a treaty with the british