New Zealand’s parliament was briefly suspended on Thursday after Maori members staged a haka to disrupt the vote on a contentious bill that would reinterpret a 184-year-old treaty between the British and Indigenous Maori.

Maori MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke made a powerful stand, tearing up the Treaty Bill and performing the haka in Parliament.

New Zealand’s parliament descended into chaos as Maori members staged a haka in protest against a bill that would “reinterpret” the country’s founding treaty.