I am certain that most of us who had gathered on the grounds of Parliament in Wellington, New Zealand, as convoys snaking across the north and south islands converged on a sunny 9 February 2022, knew that mainstream media coverage of the convoy, the gathering and whatever unfolded in the time ahead would be slanderous and untruthful. As indeed it was.

Truth, however, like a river meander, proves unstoppable over time.

Some sixteen months after the peaceful assembly of people from all areas of our country was brutally invaded and dispersed by henchmen of the political State, an extraordinary documentary film has emerged: River of Freedom.

I attended the sold-out Wellington premiere on 7 September at the Embassy Theatre and was myself transported to that relatively brief but powerful time when the citizenry reclaimed their rights, stood their ground and created, in microcosm, a society of mutual sustenance — an ideal, as it were, founded upon by charity, compassion and tolerance, and united, despite considerable diversity.