Second Hour Guest: Tim Selwyn a leading activist and writer for Tumeke in New Zealand.

A blog in New Zealand!

From Wikipedia...

Tim Selwyn (b. 1974, Takapuna) is a New Zealand political activist who was found guilty of sedition on June 8, 2006, the first person charged with sedition in New Zealand for more than 30 years.[1] He is also editor of Tumeke! magazine, and has a blog with the same name.

He was sentenced to two months imprisonment for sedition and for conspiracy to commit wilful damage on July 19, 2006 as well as identity theft and tax fraud. Selwyn was also investigated by other government agencies after his initial arrest and was sentenced to a further 15 months for dishonesty offences and benefit fraud against various departments which had occurred more than 10 years beforehand (imposed at the time of the sedition sentence) [1] - and a further 25 months for tax offences (on 14 February 2007).[2] He was released from prison in October 2007.[3]

Letters he wrote from prison were posted on his blog, prompting criticism and questions in Parliament from National's Corrections spokesman Simon Power.[4][5]

Selwyn has previously attracted controversy. In 1996, he was imprisoned for falsifying nomination signatures and was forced to resign as a member of the Glenfield Community Board, to which he had been elected unopposed. [6] He also wrote articles in Craccum criticising suicide prevention workers[7] and explaining how to rip off the student loan system; the former being condemned by the New Zealand Press Council in a ruling as "consistently irresponsible and malicious." [8] - a decision Selwyn later criticised as "ill-considered and hypocritical."[9] Selwyn has previously been a member of the ACT Party, but more recently has supported the Maori Party[10].

He is well known for his Maori nationalist views and considers himself Maori despite being of European appearance and having no known fluency in the Maori language. These views are often articulated on his blog as anti-colonialist and anti-immigrant in contrast to the left wing views espoused by his co-blogger activist Bomber Bradbury.