Group claiming ancestral heritage stands its ground in Kunia

A group called Occupied Forces Hawaii Army remained encamped on private property above Hawaii Country Club in Kunia last week, with some members claiming ancestral heritage to the land.

Frederick Arensmeyer, an attorney representing landowner Guyland LLC, said the group was told to vacate the hillside property June 13 but remained last week.

The nearby Hawaii Country Club is also owned by Guyland, and Arensmeyer said the occupants do not have permission from the landowner to be on the premises.

But one of OFHA’s group members, Alicia Hu‘eu, said on her Instagram story that, “OFHA never took the property, but rather was asked to protect the Heirs to these lands (Internationally Protected Persons) who live here.”

In a video posted to OFHA’s Instagram four weeks ago, Hu‘eu emphasized that their group is not a sovereignty group, militia or paramilitary group, but consider themselves an army corps with lawful military combatants under a noncombatant command. Their primary goal is to repatriate civilians living in occupation.

OFHA did not respond to requests for comment. A photo posted a week ago on Moleka Hicks’ Instagram shows 10 group members dressed in combat uniforms and standing side by side on the property they’ve been inhabiting.

Group members address each other by military ranking, some using made-up names, Arensmeyer said. The man who appears to be their leader goes by Col. Sam Lilikoi. Hu‘eu, a particularly vocal group member, goes by Capt. Hu‘eu, while another group member, Moleka Hicks, goes by Cpl. Hicks.

Arensmeyer said that Aloha Pacific Green, the company who Guyland had been leasing the land to, canceled its lease in October 2021, five years early, because OFHA had moved onto the property and was no longer allowing Aloha Pacific Green access to the land. But according to Arensmeyer’s recent research, Aloha Pacific Green was not registered to do business under the state of Hawaii, he said.

“I don’t know whether what they were doing out there was legal or not, but they were paying tenants and basically, these squatters chased them off and they were unable to go back in,” Arensmeyer said.

Law enforcement was notified that the group remained on Guyland’s property past their eviction date, but it’s unclear when law enforcement will forcibly remove them, Arensmeyer said.

Videos posted to Hicks’ Instagram show heated arguments between the land manager, Tom Berg, and OFHA group members, one of which appears to become physical. Some OFHA group members have attempted to file restraining orders against Berg, Arensmeyer said, but none went through.

The Honolulu Police Department did not respond in time to requests for information regarding the situation.

Arensmeyer doesn’t dispute the claim that OFHA’s group members are descendants of royal patent landholders, but he believes that doesn’t overrule a property’s chain of title without a form of documentation. The weekend before the June 13 eviction date, OFHA held an event on the property where a large number of people gathered, Arensmeyer said.

“I think in their heart, they believe that they are seeking justice and doing the right thing,” Arensmeyer said. “I think they’re being led astray by leadership of this group who are older and, they should know better to me.”

Jonathan Osorio, dean of the University of Hawaii’s Hawai‘inuiakea School of Hawaiian Knowledge, wrote in a text to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that while he doesn’t know much about the group called OFHA, he empathizes with their frustration regarding land rights.

“Apparently OFHA claims to be heirs of Namau‘u, an O‘ahu Konohiki (ali‘i who served higher ranking chiefs) who was granted a Royal Patent title to the land,” Osorio wrote. “Many of the Kanaka (Hawaii natives) … never made a claim for the lands they occupied and subsisted on. Nothing in the Mahele (legislation that began the process of dividing land to individuals) itself suggested that their right to make that claim would end or even diminish over time.”

When the U.S. took over the Hawaiian government, the abrupt transition of land tenure from the traditional system to private land ownership was messy and not accepted by Hawaiian Kingdom groups, Osorio said.

“Until the State and U.S. government actually engage honestly and clearly with Native Hawaiian land claims, no one should place the blame on groups like Occupied Forces,” Osorio said.