An activist group’s campaign to persuade ASB Bank to divest its Motorola Solutions (KiwiSaver) shares because of the company’s involvement in the illegal Israel settlements amassed significant support.
By the time the pro-Palestine groups in Tāmaki Makaurau met to deliver the petition to ASB Headquarters on Jellicoe Street at 4pm, it had over 7,900 petition signatures and 2,400 ASB customers who had pledged to withdraw funds if the bank failed to divest by today.
ASB was the first target in activist group Justice for Palestine’s “Don’t Bank on Apartheid” campaign due to its investment in Motorola Solutions Inc - one of the UN-identified companies maintaining and enabling illegal Israeli settlements.
Te Ao Māori News spoke with Teraingi Klever (Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairoa) who helped organise an action in Wellington today where 20-30 people protested at ASB Lambton Quay branch.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ruled Israel is plausibly committing genocide, declared Israel’s occupation of Palestine illegal, and said states and organisations must not assist Israel in maintaining the illegal settlements.
Most recently, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant on charges of war crimes.
ASB was the first target in activist group Justice for Palestine’s “Don’t Bank on Apartheid” campaign due to its investment in Motorola Solutions Inc - one of the UN-identified companies which are maintaining and enabling illegal Israeli settlements.
Today people went into the branches to close their accounts, cut their ASB cards, and sang a Christmas carol about “divestment from genocide”.
The action outside the bank branches addressed the lack of divestment and also acknowledged the bank had taken some actions as it has a review of its shareholding in Motorola Solutions underway.
The group also turned the outside of the ASB headquarters into what Klever described as an “ongoing war crime scene” with caution tape and posters on its “investment in apartheid”.
ASB said previous assessments of Motorola Solutions did not meet the threshold for exclusion criteria but it was undergoing a review, which would includes meetings in December and January with the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Motorola Solutions and its environment, social, governance (ESG) research provider.
Considering these steps, Te Ao Māori News asked if the activist group was still going ahead with the move to switch Kiwisaver providers.
“It’s still going forward because we appreciate that they are taking our concerns into consideration and having these meetings and reviewing these frameworks,” Klever said.
“But at the end of the day, Palestinians are at the receiving end of more and more settler violence, more and more land is being stolen, more money is being invested into telecommunications.”
Klever said, Time is of the essence, and we’re not waiting.”
The next step for Justice for Palestine is releasing content to assist people in cancelling and switching their Kiwi Savers to Pathfinder.
“ASB has a clear choice – either stand with its customers who demand ethical investment or continue risking our life savings on illegal settlements and lose customers in the thousands,” Palestinian, ASB customer and “Don’t Bank on Apartheid” campaign organiser, Nadia Abu-Shanab said..