Tens of thousands of people have marched on the New Zealand parliament in Wellington to protest against a bill that critics say strikes at the core of the country’s founding principles and dilutes the rights of Māori people.

As tens of thousands of marchers crowded the streets in New Zealand’s capital Wellington on Tuesday, the throng of people, flags aloft, had the air of a festival or a parade rather than a protest. They arrived to oppose a law that would reshape the county’s founding treaty between Indigenous Māori and the British

Police estimated that over 15,000 people were marching towards parliament, with 2,000 already gathered at the parliamentary precinct.