The remarks come during the closing ceremony of the 13th Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture (FestPAC) happening at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa.

During the ceremony, delegations from 25 nations and thousands of people packed the venue.

A standing ovation and special acknowledgement was made to Kanaky, Vanuatu and West Papua.

FestPAC serves as a platform for Pacific island nations to showcase their rich heritage and artistic talents.

The event roots trace back to the 1970s when Pacific Island nations commenced discussion on the need to preserve and promote their unique cultural identities.

Dr Sala said it was important to maintain the strength of connection going forward once the event ends.

‘Our responsibility’
“It is our responsibilty to not step away from the table,” he said.

“All of the ancestors, you also have a responsibility to make sure that we don’t fall away from the table again.”

‘Like the tifa kundu drum, the harder you hit us, the louder we become’

With its multifaceted roles, the tifa is a cornerstone of the identity and spiritual connection of many Melanesia kin.

Thankyou #MissPacific Moemoana for the shoutout and Aotearoa delegations.#FestPAC2024 pic.twitter.com/tpS5P8n2QI

— Ronny Kareni (@ronnykareni) June 14, 2024

He addressed the crowds and said his hope for this festival was one of legacy and influence and hopes it will inspire generations to combat the pressing issues Pacific populations are facing such as the impacts of climate change.

“Perhaps the most important part of this fesitival is when a 10-year-old born to Palaun parents was able to visit his people and in 20 years is getting a PhD in ocean science because he is concerned about the ocean around Palau.”

“I invite everyone around the world if you are Pasifika, start preparing for FestPac14. Let us all back the next family reunion in 2028 — the biggest and the best,” Kairua said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Melanesians all across Aotearoa are coming together in Auckland this weekend to celebrate their unique cultural heritage.

This is the second time the annual Melanesian Festival Aotearoa is being held and it is an opportunity for community members from Fiji, Kanaky New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to fully immerse in their culture.

More than 7000 people attended the inaugural event last year which was a huge success.

Cultural performances, musical showcases, traditional food, arts and craft were on display and enjoyed by all.

Festival director Albert Traill said this festival is “something unique for New Zealand because New Zealand is a predominantly Polynesian-based society when it comes to Pacific Islands communities”.

He expressed that sometimes the Melanesian community feel left out or lost in the crowd and their numbers are smaller in comparison to their Polynesian brothers and sisters.

“Melanesian culture and music is really different to Polynesia. Very similar, but it has its own unique feel,” Traill said.

Annual event
The community have been talking about organising their own cultural festival for years, and with the support of Creative New Zealand, it is now an annual event.

“It’s an opportunity for our Melanesian community to come out and have a space for us to share our culture, our food, and just to come together and celebrate each other’s identity and culture.

“We love it here in New Zealand because New Zealand is a country that loves and supports cultural diversity.”

Traill has a smile in his voice as he reflects on the success of last year’s festival, sharing how many of the performances were youth driven.

The young ones spent months researching their countries and consulting with community elders and knowledge holders, to produce outstanding items.

Their pride and passion shone on stage, striking a string in the hearts of their family and friends

‘Everyone in tears’
“And pretty much everyone was in tears hearing them share how special they felt. Normally they get lumped in with Polyfest and, and all the other festivals and stuff. But this one, for the first time ever, they could say, ‘this is my festival. It’s Melanesian’.”

“We’re doing it for the young people,” he says.

“So hopefully one day when we’re not here, they can stand up with the same pride and say, ‘Yeah, you know what? I’m Melanesia. And I’m proud to share my culture’.”

The festival will be held at the Waitemata Rugby Club Grounds in Henderson from 9am onwards with a packed programme.

The cultural performances begin at 10am and there are a few popular reggae artists and bands hailing from the Solomon Islands, Fiji and Papua New Guinea.

Community groups from Christchurch, Tauranga, Waikato and Wellington are travelling up to participate and the entertainment will continue until late in the afternoon.

Cultural activation spaces will also be spread around the grounds showcasing the traditional weaving and tapa printing of Melanesia.

Ancient tatooing style
The ancient style of Papua New Guinea tattooing will also be on display.

It will be a vibrant hub of cultural identity and heritage and the the organizers warmly welcome any interested ones to come along and join in the celebrations.

“Come and have a look, come and see Melanesia,” Traill said.

“Melanesia is like the Tuakana of the Pacific, the older sibling, the older ancient cultures. You’re looking at 10,000 years of history in the Pacific. A lot of these are ancient old cultures and very complex.”

The organisers expect this year to be even bigger and better, and it will only grow each consecutive year.

They are already looking into further expanding the festival for 2024 and are looking to collaborate with embassies to fly across talented local artists and cultural performance groups to join in next years Melanesia Festival.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific leaders fear they will have little or no voice in the new National-led government in Aotearoa New Zealand with the real possibility of not a single Pacific person making it into the new coalition.

Labour had 11 Pacific members of Parliament, then 10 when then Communications Minister Kris Faafoi left. Included was Carmel Sepuloni who became Deputy Prime Minister when Chris Hipkins became leader.

National currently has one possible Pacific MP, Angee Nicholas, but she may lose the Te Atatū seat on special votes, leading with only a margin of 30 over Labour’s Phil Twyford.

But even though the race is tight, she said on social media she had been stopped and congratulated by community members.

“It is going to be close but I hope to bring it home now,” Angee said in a post to social media.

National list MP Agnes Loheni has not made the cut as things currently stand.

Pacific political commentator Thomas Wynne said it meant that the number of Pacific people in government might very well go to one or even zero.

Who is it?
“Here’s my question to National, who is it exactly that you’re going to have as the minister for Pacific people? Because if Angee doesn’t get in and neither does Agnes, then who?” Wynne asked.

“Because you don’t have any Pacific people in there.

“Chris Luxon has said he has a party of diversity, well I’m sorry but that’s just not the case.”

At the moment Dr Shane Reti is the Pacific people’s spokesperson for National.

On the campaign trail Dr Reti said “attending to the cost of living” was one of the most impactful things that could be done for Pacific people.

Pacific community advocate Melissa Lama said she did not know how National planned to make decisions on Pacific issues.

“To me that’s really scary to have one person represent a massive group of New Zealand society who are visible which is our Pacific people, I just can’t get over that.”

Disheartened over results
Lama said she felt disheartened after the results.

“If we look at some of the campaigning slogans and narratives that particularly on the right side, National and Act, have had throughout this election it doesn’t necessarily give me hope for what’s to come for my future and my children’s future,” she said on Sunday.

“I’m definitely gutted. I feel a bit low mood today.”

On Saturday, at a Pacific election watch party in Ilam, Christchurch, most attendees opted to socialise outside instead of watching the results.

Views on what’s to come for Pasifika are mixed. There’s some excitement for change but also nerves.

A common thread was concern that the Ministry for Pacific Peoples would be scrapped.

However, just last week the now incoming Prime Minister told RNZ Pacific he would not bow to ACT.

“Our position very strongly is I’ve been supportive of the Pacific Peoples Ministry. I haven’t been supportive of the management of it. When you have a $40,000 farewell I think that’s insane,” Luxon said.

Keeping an optimistic outlook
Deputy Mayor of Waitaki Hana Halalele who is also the general manager of Oamaru Pacific Island Community Group said she was disappointed about the results but was trying to be optimistic.

Despite the drop in Pacific representation in Parliament, Wynne wants to focus on the positives and asks frustrated Pacific community members to hold National and ACT to account on what they have promised.

“I feel it’s time for us to not think about what we’re losing because that day is done — that was yesterday and really we need to start looking at the opportunity of what this new government affords us, because shouting from the sidelines is not going to help,” he said.

Wynne said Act’s vision was for less government and more community involvement could be beneficial.

He also said Act had promised a return of charter schools, which could be good for Pasifika.

Tongan community leader Pakilau Manase Lua, who is leading the charge on fighting for justice for ongoing Dawn Raids said National and Act had been clear on overstayers.

“They don’t support any pathway to residency for people who are overstaying or who may have been stuck here during the lockdowns and had no other option but to try and find a way to settle.”

Pakilau said while there was concern for overstayers, he was still holding out hope the new government would surprise him.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

From today readers of rnz.co.nz will see a change to the home page, and a new initiative to tell the stories of Aotearoa New Zealand’s Asian community.

RNZ.co.nz has added a lineup of four sections which focus on the growing communities of Aotearoa and are placed right at the top of the home page.

Elevated links have been added to RNZ’s existing Te Ao Māori and Pacific sections.

RNZ has also launched two new sections for Chinese and Indian New Zealanders and added them at the top of the home page as well.

The sections are part of a new initiative to speak to and report on issues in the growing Asian communities of New Zealand.

The new Indian section features original stories in English by specialist reporters.

The Chinese section has stories in the simplified Chinese script. Original stories are there as well as translations of RNZ news stories of interest to the Chinese community.

NZ On Air survey
RNZ is starting with the simplified script and will then scope whether it is feasible and useful to translate using the traditional script as well.

The different approaches are a response to a NZ On Air survey which found the Indian and Chinese communities had different language needs and approaches to seeking out news.

This is one of RNZ’s first steps into daily translated news. Before the launch, RNZ put systems in place to make sure it is getting translations right. The stories are double, and triple checked.

RNZ is also asking for feedback to make sure it is getting it right on each story and will conduct regular independent audits to make sure our translations are on track. RNZ is keen for feedback.

The new Indian and Chinese sections are a result of a two-year collaboration with NZ On Air. The unit of reporters and translators is being funded for the first year through the Public Interest Journalism Fund; the second year will be funded by RNZ, with a right of renewal after that.

Stories from the Asian unit will also be made available to more than 40 media organisations across the country and the Pacific.

RNZ believes that it is vital that RNZ supplies news to many different communities within Aotearoa New Zealand.

The Asian population in New Zealand is growing fast, particularly in Auckland.

In 2018, Asian New Zealanders made up 15 percent of the New Zealand population. The two largest groups are the Chinese and Indian New Zealanders, with about 250,000 people each.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Many Pasifika families affected by the flash floods and torrential rainfall that have lashed New Zealand’s North Island over the past few days were braced for more bad weather overnight.

With four people dead and hundreds forced out of their homes over the weekend a state of emergency remained in force for Auckland and one has also now been issued for Northland.

The predominately Pasifika neighbourhood of Māngere is among the worst affected areas in Auckland.

Streets throughout the suburb were submerged after torrential rain last Friday caused rivers to overflow their banks.

Māngere resident Louisa Opetaia said the water rose so suddenly that it rapidly flooded her entire home while she was still asleep.

“When I got home from work, I took a nap at about 7.30pm. When I woke up an hour later and I got off my bed, I splashed into water,” said Opetaia.

“It was already halfway up my calf and up to my knee, and the three rooms in my house were flooded,” she added.

Emergency centres were quickly set up, providing supplies and temporary shelter over the weekend and even now to the dozens of families displaced by the floods.

One of the busiest centres is the Māngere Memorial Hall in Manukau.

Auckland city councillor Alf Filipaina, who has been helping to organise relief efforts, said many families continued to arrive at the hall on Tuesday, requiring basic goods and household items ruined by the floods.

“Heaps of families have been affected and we’ve been working tirelessly,” said Filipaina.

“We’ve had all the groups here from KaingaOra, the Fono, Ministry of Social Development and others. They’re all here helping people,” he said.

“We’ll be open 24/7 for people who also want a roof over their heads.”

Filipaina said that some families were in a desperate situation, being forced out of their homes and having lost most of their possessions, including even their vehicles.

“There are people who need financial assistance,” said Filipaina.

“Some of them have lost everything, and we can only give what donations and goods that we have,” he explained.

The community response has been swift in Manukau with various agencies and good Samaritans donating goods and providing services, including from local heroes such as David Tua and All Black Ofa Tu’ungafasi.

“People are always offering to help,” Louisa Opetaia said.

“People have been taking our laundry to the laundromat for us, which is really helpful, and we’ve received a lot of food. That’s what I love about our Pasifika community in Māngere, everyone comes together when people need help.

“We were able to talk to Ministry of Social Development at the Māngere Memorial Hall. I’m not on the benefit so I wasn’t sure if I would qualify for any help but I do.”

Opetaia said she was now moving out of her house as it was too hazardous to live there.

She said the biggest challenge for her at the moment was getting rid of damaged furniture drenched and ruined by the floods.

“We are trying to get the council to help us get a skip bin so that we can throw anything that was affected by the flood waters, and we have a big pile of stuff at the moment,” Opetaia said.

“I understand that there a lot of people who are more severely affected than us. We do need help but at the same time we are grateful because we are in a better situation than others.”

Meanwhile, according to the NZ Metservice many Aucklanders living south of Orewa may not see heavy rain last night — but localised downpours were still forecast for some.

Meteorologist Georgina Griffiths told RNZ Checkpoint that the key danger was rain falling on saturated soil making the region flood quickly.

But she predicted some parts of the city would escape a deluge.

Georgina Griffiths said Auckland was nearly out of the woods, with a drier weekend forecast and a dry week from Tuesday.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Twenty four Pacific peoples have been recognised in the 2023 New Year’s honours.

A former Premier of Niue, Young Vivian, leads the list of distinguished Pacific peoples in the list.

Vivian has been made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to Niue.

Fiji-born Dr Api Talemaitoga, a familiar face to Pacific communities during the height of covid-19 in Aotearoa, has been acknowledged for his decades of service in the medical sector.

The first Pacific priest ordained in Rome in 1990, Father Paulo Filoialii of Samoa, has been recognised for services to the Pacific community.

Also on the honours list is Lisa Taouma, the producer and director of Coconet TV, the largest pool of Pacific content on screen in New Zealand.

And the lead singer of the popular band Ardijah, Betty-Anne Monga, has been recognised for services to music.

‘Better things will come’: Niue’s Young Vivian
Young Vivian started his career as a teacher in New Zealand.

He went to a British school based on an English system. He failed English and was told to leave because enrolments were backed up.

He said he “begged the education officer” to stay so he was sent to Northland College and was “very happy” there.

Community members say he has been instrumental in fostering a love for Vagahau Niue, or Niue language, as a respected elder.

Speaking to RNZ Pacific reporter Lydia Lewis in 2022, at the launch of the Niue language app in Auckland, Vivian said:

“A language is a key to your culture and your tradition. It gives you that spiritual strength of who you are and you are able to face the world,” he said.

“That’s very, very important to a small nation like Niue who has a population of only 2500 people, but here in Australia and New Zealand it’s 80,000.”

When he went home to Niue, he was “dissatisfied”.

“I want to be fully independent, but I could see signs that people were not acceptable to that so I gave up, only then we can be real Niueans,” Vivian said.

His message to Pacific leaders is to believe in themselves.

“They must depend on themselves and God, they have everything in their homes, they need guts, stickability and determination, small as they are, they can stand up to it.”

He encourages the next generation to go back to basics.

“You have to depend on literally what you’ve got,” he said.

‘Profound privilege’: Dr Api
Dr Api Talemaitoga has been acknowledged for his decades-long work in the medical sector.

“I see it as a profound privilege, I have this knowledge about health and I find it a real pleasure to do it.”

More than three decades in the job after graduating in 1986, he has a deep sense of pride for the next generation.

“I was really fortunate to be given the opportunity to give the graduation address at the University of Otago for medical students,” he said.

“To see the highest number of Pasifika medical students walk across the stage was really emotional.

“I can happily retire now that I see this new generation of young people, enthusiastic, bright, diverse and they are the ones that will carry on the load in the future.”

Dr Talemaitoga always has a smile on his face and an infectious laugh, he is incredibly hard to get hold of because he is always helping his patients.

When asked how he keeps his charisma day in day out, he said:

“I am not superhuman, some days are just dreadful and you come home feeling really disillusioned and what’s the point of all of this when you see three or four people in a row heading for dialysis,” he said.

“Then you have days where you make a difference to one person out of the 25 or 30 you see that day.

“They feel really encouraged that you’ve been able for the first time to explain their condition to them … you can’t put it in words, it’s such an amazing feeling.”

‘This is for you, not me’: Father Paulo
The first Pacific Priest ordained in Rome in 1990 – Father Paulo Sagato Filoialii is dedicating his medal to the community he has served for decades, that has in turn backed him.

“I want to offer this medal for the Pacific Island people, this is for you, not for me. This medal I will receive is for all of you and I thank you all for your prayers, for your love and your support, God bless you all,” he said.

Father Paulo has contributed his time to the Catholic community in Christchurch and Ashburton.

Upon Father Filoialii being ordained, the Samoan Mass was performed for the first time in the Vatican, resulting in Pope John Paul II decreeing that the Samoan Mass can now be performed anywhere in the world.

‘Proud’: The Coconet TV’s Lisa Taouma
Pioneering Pasifika producer and director Lisa Taouma paved the way for Pacific peoples in media.

She created the ground-breaking site The Coconet TV which is the largest pool of Pacific content on screen in Aotearoa.

On top of that she made the Polyfest series, the long-standing Pacific youth series Fresh, five award-winning documentaries, the feature film Teine Sa and two short films.

Taouma believes you are only as good as the people you bring through.

“I’m proud of having brought Pacific stories to the fore around the world, I am proud of having brought Pacific people with me into that space, that is what I am most proud of,” She said.

Taouma said it was awesome that more indigenous people were being recognised globally.

While she is humbled to receive the honour, she admits not accepting it crossed her mind.

“I felt quite conflicted at the start, you know there are problems with the idea of empire and how Pacific people have been treated under the history of the British Empire,” she said.

“At the same time, it is really important to stand in this space as a Pacific woman and to have more Pacific people recognised by the Crown if you like.

“This is a system that is hopefully more reflective of Aotearoa and where we stand now.”

‘I never looked back’: Sully Paea
Niuean youth-worker Sully Paea has dedicated his life to working with youth, founding the East Tamaki Youth and Resource Centre between the late 1970s and 1986.

Paea said he was lost. He battled alcoholism and pushed through a diagnosis of depression. He had a violent criminal career until he met his wife which changed him completely.

He has dedicated his life to working with youth, founding the East Tamaki Youth and Resource Centre between the late 1970s and 1986.

After 40 years serving the community, he has never looked back

‘We’re getting there as people’: Tafilau Nina Kirifi-Alai
Tafilau Nina Kirifi-Alai has been honoured for her great services to Pacific Development.

Kirifi-Alai has been the Pacific manager of Otago University for more than 20 years.

She has assisted scholarships of Pacific students and has led developments for the University of Otago to support Pacific tertiary institutions in the region.

“Seeing Pasifika communities graduating from university has been rewarding,” she said.

“To see all those colours in the garments and all those families and all that, was like oh yeah we are getting there, we’re getting there as a people. This is why we left our homes to seek greater opportunities, education wise and work wise, and I actually believe that education is the key.”

‘Knowing your culture, knowing your roots’: Rosanna Raymond
Activism is what paved the road for multidisciplinary artist and curator Rosanna Raymond.

Her work has taken her to China, Australia and Britain, where she has built an awareness of Pacific art and fashion.

She draws on her strong cultural bond to artefacts that were taken from their original land and are now displayed in museums throughout the world.

She made a huge written contribution by co-publishing Pasifika Styles: Artists inside the Museum in 2008 and was Honorary Research Associate at the Department of Anthropology and Institute of Archaeology at University College, London.

She said moving forward whilst staying true to several of her roots was what led her to where she was today.

The full list of Pasifika in the New Year’s Honours list are:

To be Companions of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
The honourable Mititaiagimene Young Vivian, former Premier of Niue – For services to Niue.

To be Officers of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
Nathan Edward Fa’avae – For services to adventure racing, outdoor education and the Pacific community

David Rodney Fane – For services to the performing arts

Dr Apisalome Sikaidoka Talemaitoga – For services to health and the Pacific community

Lisa-Jane Taouma – For services to Pacific arts and the screen industry

To be Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
Father Paulo Sagato Filoialii – For services to the Pacific community

Sefita ‘Alofi Hao’uli – For services to Tongan and Pacific communities

Lakiloko Tepae Keakea – For services to Tuvaluan art

Marilyn Rhonda Kohlhase – For services to Pacific arts and education

Felorini Ruta McKenzie – For services to Pacific education

Betty-Anne Maryrose Monga – For services to music

Sullivan Luao Paea – For services to youth

Rosanna Marie Raymond – For services to Pacific art

The Queen’s Service Medal:
Kinaua Bauriri Ewels – For services to the Kiribati community

Galumalemana Fetaiaimauso Marion Galumalemana – For services to the Pacific community

Hana Melania Halalele – For services to Pacific health

Teurukura Tia Kekena – For services to the Cook Islands and Pacific communities

Nanai Pati Muaau – For services to Pacific health

Lomia Kaipati Semaia Naniseni – For services to the Tokelau community

Ma’a Brian Sagala – For services to Pacific communities

Mamaitaloa Sagapolutele – For services to education and the Pacific community

Honorary:
Tofilau Nina Kirifi-Alai – For services to education and the Pacific community

Tuifa’asisina Kasileta Maria Lafaele – For services to Pacific health

Nemai Divuluki Vucago – For services to Fijian and Pacific communities

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The widow of the final victim in the 2019 terrorist attack says things have not improved for New Zealand Muslims.

Hamimah Amhat was recently exercising in Christchurch when a passing motorist screamed at her to go back to her country.

“That shook me, I just had to sit down and let myself calm down.”

Amhat said she did not stoop to the level of such hatred but found herself feeling bitterly disappointed.

“It was broad daylight and in a university area. That is just one of the recent incidents that has happened to me but I know of plenty of others too which is very discouraging.”

New Zealand’s annual gathering on countering terrorism and violent extremism, He Whenua Taurikura Hui 2022, got underway in Auckland today.

Members of the Māori, Pasifika, Jewish, Muslim, rainbow, and many more communities will unite at the Cordis Hotel for the two-day hui.

Conversations crucial
Amhat said conversations were crucial to prevent another mass murder.

Zekeriya Tuyan was the 51st victim of the 15 March 2019 terror attack, passing away 48 days after being shot in the chest.

He was survived by his beloved wife and two sons.

“The boys were very young, we lost a great friend, husband and father.”

Amhat said her husband treated her like a queen and she was still getting used to opening doors for herself as Tuyan always insisted on doing this for her.

“Simple things like that, he put me on a pedestal.”

Amhat is the chair of the Sakinah Community Trust, a kaupapa created by the daughters, wives and sisters of March 15 victims.

Strength and well-being
“It involves promotion of strength and well-being in the community.”

Among the many initiatives the group is involved with is Unity Week, which runs from March 15-22.

“It is about galvanising our allies, and touching the hearts of those sitting on the fence.”

The week acknowledges the affected communities which Amhat said were not just the people who were directly impacted by the events.

“It’s also the people who pulled up their sleeves and got together even though they were grieving as well and in shock, they made time to help the families and make sure the community continued to function.”

Amhat said the Muslim community could not sit back and wait for tolerance to come to them.

“People find it hard to approach us, just recently my driving instructor told me, ‘I didn’t know how to react to a Muslim woman,’ and I just had to tell him to smile, we are human beings.”

She said education was key to dispelling fears and myths.

‘Sharing our space together’
“We invite them to share our space together. Cut through our skin and we bleed red blood.”

While we were moving forward as a nation, things could be faster and more effective, Amhat said.

She cited recent incidents in Aotearoa including the Dunedin student who had her hijab ripped off, New Zealand soldiers linked to white supremacist groups and school board nominees spouting hateful ideology.

Amhat said anti-Chinese racism was also prevalent during the pandemic.

“It was as if people had forgotten about March 15 and racism actually increased towards the Chinese and everyone else who looked Chinese to those discriminatory people.”

Formalities at the hui began by acknowledging the survivors of the 2019 terrorist attack in Christchurch.

The morning then focussed on the consequences of colonialism and near two centuries of Pākehā dominance in Aotearoa.

‘Colonial entitlement’ still rife
Auckland University professor of indigenous studies Tracey McIntosh opened panel discussions looking at why the country needed to face deep but necessary discomfort over the impact colonisation had for Māori.

This included relocation, confiscation and invasion.

“Of all the times I hear government agencies say Te Tiriti, if there is one word that seems to avoid their tongue, that’s the word colonialism,” McIntosh said.

Those impacts included dishonouring the Treaty with impunity, mass incarceration, immigration policies and racialised myth making, she said.

“The forces that brought us here today are no less than pure, distilled, colonial entitlement.”

There was a responsibility of powers to humbly engage with the issue of racism, McIntosh said.

“You have centrist power mongers who passively protect and maintain colonial privilege while presenting themselves as benign allies.”

Independent body
Māori deserved an independent body to monitor threats, she said.

“While extremists get the most attention, because they are the loudest and most violent, they hold less structural power.”

Both the Crown and government agencies had a lot of work to do, McIntosh said.

“Taking on a Māori name and logo but not sharing power is not equality.”

New Zealand had seen the rise of groups that represented hate and hostility through online emboldenment, she said.

The 2019 terror attack disturbed New Zealand’s complacency, McIntosh said.

Another prominent Māori leader said his people continued to endure terrorism at the hands of the state.

Enduring terror acts
Bill Hamilton of the National Iwi Chairs Forum spoke of the terror acts his people had endured such as invasion and abduction.

“Our children were taken and continue to be taken by the likes of Oranga Tamariki, and those are violent terrorist acts on our people.”

Aotearoa still had very subtle and sneaky forms of racism today, he said.

Hamilton said what was supposed to guarantee protection, equality and a mutually beneficial relationship — Te Tiriti o Waitangi — had instead seen the demonisation of Māori leaders, beatings for use of te reo, and widespread invasion.

“Our grandparents were beaten as kids for speaking their language.”

The state needed to apologise for the terror inflicted on the Māori people, he said.

Hamilton believed there had been a residual effect across society where people viewed Māori as less than equal.

He Whenua Taurikura Hui 2022 continues tomorrow with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern scheduled to speak about 9am at Cordis Hotel.

The topic will be diversity in democracy, creating safe spaces online and countering messages of hate.

Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN) is represented at the hui by Auckland University of Technology communications academic and Pacific Journalism Review assistant editor Khairiah A Rahman.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A few weeks ago this article from Stuff (24 Sep) was drawn to my attention: The shocking stats that prove Covid19 does not kill equally. While I have some problems with the article’s interpretation of the data, by and large the article itself was reasonable. Less so the headline, which is different in the online version of the story. (The print version omits the sensationalist word ‘shocking’. I wonder if there is a general pattern to present online versions of stories in a more sensationalist manner?)

In fact, there’s nothing surprising about the Covid19 statistics indicating more Māori and Pasifika deaths. The charts in the article, however, perpetrate the erroneous interpretation in the headline, that Covid19 is in some evil sense discriminatory. (In particular the chart that shows death rates of people aged over 90.) The facts are that, among population subgroups, Covid19 mortality reflects differences in general mortality.

With respect to recent data (ie since the beginning of August), just two Pasifika people have died of Covid19 (as the ‘underlying cause); one in their 70s, and one aged under 60 (though 20 others have died ‘with’ Covid19). Ten Māori have died of Covid19 in that recent time period (32 others ‘with’ covid), only one of whom was over 90. In that same time period, 176 people of ‘European or other’ ethnicity died of Covid19, 56 of whom were aged over 90.

While the article was about the whole pandemic, not just its recent phase, it remains no more useful to focus on deaths of Pasifika aged over 90 than it does to focus on Pakeha aged over 100. Regardless of Covid19, the probability that a New Zealander of Pacific Island descent will reach the age of 90 is similar to the probability that a Pakeha New Zealander will reach 100.

Life Expectancy by Ethnicity

Ethnicity statistics in Aotearoa New Zealand should always be treated with caution. For example, a person with just one Māori great-grandparent would typically be classified as Māori, regardless of the ethnicities of the other seven great-grandparents. (This suggests that the mortality and morbidity statistics are even worse for people whose predominant ethnicity is Māori, especially for people who are perceived as Māori [either due to their name or to their appearance].)

If we try to compare socio-economic ‘apples’ with socio-economic ‘apples’, we have almost no data which can give the true picture. My suspicion is that a dapper Māori man such as Scotty Morrison has a similar life expectancy as his Pakeha equivalents. And my suspicion is that a Pakeha solo-mum with three children in emergency housing has a similar life expectancy as a Māori solo-mum in the same situation. Generally, we are very light on evidence that Māori and Pasifika people have lower life expectancies than their Pakeha neighbours.

The problem is that, in proportion to their sub-population totals, relatively more Māori and Pasifika are in impoverished or facing other stressful life circumstances. The telling Covid19 statistics are shown in the table below. The median ages of death for the different ethnicities, estimated from Ministry of Health covid mortality data, are:

We may regard the final row of the above table as valid estimates for life expectancy for each sub-population. It’s not a pretty picture for Māori. What it says is that Māori have significantly more health comorbidities than other ethnic groups. In particular, this represents the socio-economic circumstances that many Māori face; this reflects significant inequality among Aotearoans in general, and also within the Māori sub-population. It reflects the substantial problem in New Zealand of rural poverty. It reflects historical circumstances faced by indigenous peoples throughout the ‘new world’. Some of that is due to biological circumstances which go back into deep history. These include being at the wrong end of the immunity gradients for most diseases during the globalisation phases of world history; and it reflects – for example – an evolutionary context which, among other things, makes Māori (and Pasifika) people comparatively intolerant to alcohol and sugar. (In Eurasia, tolerance to alcohol was a biological adaptation to the problem of water-born diseases. In England a culture developed, especially among men, of drinking ‘small beer’ instead of water. In other places, wine and other fermented drinks were partial substitutes for water.)

The above ‘life-expectancy’ table (especially the second row) also suggests that people with substantial comorbidities are more likely to get Covid19 as well as being more likely to die of Covid19.

Getting back to the interpretation of the Stuff article, because life expectancy for Māori and Pasifika is so much lower than for Pakeha, it means that we should be comparing covid mortality rates for Māori/Pasifika in their 60s with Pakeha in their 70s, comparing Māori/Pasifika in their 70s with Pakeha in their 80s, and Māori/Pasifika in their 80s with Pakeha in their 90s. A randomly chosen Māori person of a particular age, in essence, is as likely to die (from any cause) within twelve months as a similarly chosen Pakeha person ten years older.

While discrimination is certainly part of the ‘historical circumstance’ problem many Māori face, Covid19 doesn’t add to that problem; it simply reflects it. (And we should note that historical discrimination is more nuanced than intellectually-lazy words like ‘colonisation’ or ‘imperialism’ convey. Subsequent to the era of industrial capitalism which began at scale around 200 years ago, life expectancies have increased, with the life expectancies of ‘white’ people (and latterly East Asian people) increasing the most. While non-imperial historical counterfactuals might have had a smaller life-expectancy gap between Polynesian peoples and (say) Anglo-Celtic peoples, it is unlikely any such counterfactuals could have achieved a higher life expectancy for Māori than Māori have now.

Co-mortality and critical states

The final issue of importance to note is that ’cause of death’ is not a simple discrete matter. In an important sense, probably most deaths are due to ‘old age’, but few other than the Queen of England have the privilege of having ‘old age’ listed as their sole cause of death.

The reality is that most deaths have more than one ‘clinical’ cause, and environmental events such as pandemics can kill in non-clinical as well as clinical ways. (Poor quality, under-resourced, or inaccessible health services count here.) In the fable of ‘the straw breaking the camel’s back’, ‘straw’ would never be listed as the sole cause of that camel’s subsequent death. The camel was in a critical state before the straw added, fatally, to its burden.

It’s interesting that ‘comorbidity’ is listed as a word in the dictionary, but ‘comortality’ is not.

Co-mortality is the reason why an ‘excess deaths’ approach is the best indicator of the scale of epidemic deaths. The sadness is that demography is the poor cousin of social science. Much core demographic data – births by sex, deaths by age/sex and place of birth, arrival/departures by age/sex and place of birth – is hard to find in even the rich world. In many countries it remains largely absent. Population censuses are required to make up for poor record-keeping; but too often they are under-resourced, and the value of the core demographic information is under-understood. In New Zealand we remain substantially ignorant about intra-national population movements.

Almost all the Covid19 deaths tallied – whether ‘with covid’, of ‘covid’, or ‘as a consequence of covid’ – are in fact co-mortal deaths. Very few people have died of Covid19 without some other vulnerability being present.

What matters most is an understanding of critical states. Typically, when things go wrong there are multiple causes. Today we use the increasingly popular (and indeed overused) phrase ‘perfect storm’ to indicate the problem. A person is in a critical state when just one additional factor will kill them. (High blood-pressure is one oft-cited factor that can contribute to a person being in a critical state.)

Surprisingly, a person in a critical state may to all intents and purposes be healthy. One person may be much more vulnerable than another to a particular fatal illness, but not obviously so. One seemingly small trigger event may have a fatal impact on that person, but may have no impact on the other person. For a person in a critical state, a trigger event may be sufficient to cause death. (Or, as in ‘chronic fatigue syndrome’ which incorporates ‘long covid’, a trigger event can initiate a long period of chronic unwellness for some people but not others.) An otherwise healthy individual with, say, the Huntingdon’s gene may in fact be in a critical state; one small trigger may unleash the uncurable disease.

‘Old age’ is a critical state; a state which some people – and some peoples – reach earlier than others.

Systems may or may not be in a critical state. (The name ‘critical state’ comes from the nuclear sciences.) A highly stressed population is likely to be in a critical state; especially a population having to constantly negotiate with unsympathetic bureaucracies, permanently raising the levels of cortisol in the bloodstream. A homeless person will likely be in a critical state, meaning that a trigger such as a covid infection could have elevated consequences.

If Māori are more likely to be homeless, or have no socially-approved source of income, then Māori are more likely to die in a pandemic. And die at younger ages.

Is Covid19 a trigger that’s causing human existence to unravel? I suspect that a keyword search on the word ‘existential’ would show a big uptick this decade. Growth capitalism, the way we practice it, is a system that places most people in a near-critical state. (If a critical state is when one more aggravation is fatal, then a near-critical state is when two more aggravations are fatal.) There are signs that this comparatively mild infectious disease has triggered a turning point in global history, and that’s partly because the climate system was already in a critical state.

While Covid19 has been a disease of the rich, and spread mainly by the rich, it is a disease that has revealed the widespread comorbidities – critical states and near-critical states – which our economically vulnerable populations experience. So while the (often oblivious) privileged sub-populations spread covid more while suffering less – not unlike the environmental consequences of careless human behaviour – it is the sub-populations in critical and near-critical states who die the most.

Our systemic problems are our systems in critical states; superficially they may have looked healthy before 2020. Since then, for those willing to see, Covid19 has become the highlighter, not the central problem. If we are homo sapiens – wise ‘men’ – we will look to solutions which destress our systems. What we should not do is aggravate our systemic problems by converting near-critical systems into critical systems; into systems that can become ‘perfect storms’, destroyable by mere straws.

Is Covid19 returning?

My recent statistical analyses suggest ‘yes’. See my Tourist Europe again: Covid19 Waves compared (Evening Report, 17 October 2022). Spain has just had its worst round of Covid19 deaths since April 2020. Covid’s arriving now, in those full aircraft coming here. October is peak season for people flying from Europe to New Zealand. And of course, covid is circulating domestically, and is known to resurge as immunity wanes. It is far too soon to think that Covid19 has become just a winter problem.

If New Zealand’s ability to cope in 2020 and 2021 was weak, and required drastic emergency measures then, New Zealand’s ability to cope this summer may be even weaker. Aotearoa New Zealand is now facing a ‘cost-of-living crisis’, in an economy with severe labour shortages. The New Zealand economy is in a critical state; it is ‘supply inelastic’, meaning it has no surge capacity to respond to a new imported crisis.

Policy is now focussed on creating a recession, the only way today’s policymakers believe they can respond to recent increases in the price level. (Refer to these RNZ stories: Domestic inflation rise ‘a shocker’ – economists; Analysis: Inflation rate higher than expected; Unemployment next challenge for economy – experts.)

New Zealand as a whole was not in a critical state in February 2020. It’s closer to being in such a state today. Marginalised sub-populations will be affected most from any trigger events this decade. Many, but by no means all, vulnerable New Zealanders are of Māori or Pasifika ethnicity.

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

The new vice-chancellor of the Auckland University of Technology is calling on young Pasifika peoples pursuing their education to stay the course.

Toeolesulusulu Dr Damon Salesa, who is currently a pro vice-chancellor at the University of Auckland takes up his new role at AUT in March.

He is the first person of Pacific descent to head a university in New Zealand.

Toeolesulusulu said the past two years of the covid-19 pandemic have been the most difficult for education in a long time.

He said part of the reason he chose to take up the new role was that AUT provides a pathway to education for people of all ages, backgrounds and races, regardless of the life stage or academic credentials.

“The pressures of the pandemic have forced many young people to have to choose between furthering their education or providing for their families, and institutions like AUT can help.

“Now is a great time to just leave school and get a job,” Toeolesulusulu said.

“But in terms of the future that students’ families need, that our city and our communities need, education still remains the single most powerful way to transform the lives of you and your family and through them our communities.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

“We hear a lot of anecdotal reports of that. Also, the rules were relaxed a bit in terms of more social gathering outdoors and outdoor gatherings on the face of it should be relatively low risk because there’s better ventilation, but of course, it does provide more opportunities for mixing and they may turn into indoor parties and so on,” he told RNZ Checkpoint tonight.

“So I think we are seeing those effects.”

He said on the plus side, as the number of people vaccinated increased, the reproduction number would decrease.

Hurting Māori and Pasifika
However, the outbreak could still get out of control, hurting Māori and Pasifika in particular.

“The unvaccinated are increasingly Māori and Pacific people. So we do run the risk of this becoming a very unequal outbreak, and I think that’s a really critical factor that government needs to look at, at the moment.”

Professor Baker also said a level 4 lockdown may still be necessary, depending on the outbreak’s movement.

“I don’t think that we can rule out the need for some kind of circuit breaker lockdown in the future, but at the moment, it looks like the system is managing these numbers.”

He said if the country could reach 90 percent vaccination coverage, it would be reasonable to move to level 2.

He said Auckland’s border could be dropped by Christmas “potentially” if there was uniformly high vaccine coverage across Aotearoa.

“This is where I think we could definitely move down to alert level two, which actually puts very few barriers in the way of the virus, in practice, and in addition, we could have the schools open again.

“So I think that would be a good point to make that move.”

But it was critical that high vaccination coverage included Māori and Pasifika demographics, for dropping the border to be safe, he said.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The calls for New Zealanders to get vaccinated are becoming more urgent by the day as covid-19 embeds itself in the community.

Two people have now died in the latest outbreak, the number of daily cases remains in the double figures and the virus continues to spread outside Auckland.

The government has announced a nationwide immunisation push for October 16 — dubbed Super Saturday — but one of Auckland’s leading Māori vaccinators is questioning what it will achieve.

Te Whānau o Waipareira runs two mass vaccination centres, and has given tens of thousands of Aucklanders their Pfizer shots.

Chief executive John Tamihere said the first he heard of Super Saturday was when Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins announced it at a media conference, saying it would be like election day, with clinics open all day and into the night

Tamihere said that would not cut it when it came to getting vaccine stragglers.

“They won’t necessarily turn up, the ones they are endeavouring to target. We have to go out into the streets and take each suburb street by street and to do that you’ve got to know where you’re sending and deploying your resources,” Tamihere said.

More resources rather than big show
“We would probably put a lot more resource into that campaign as opposed to big show days.”

The Ministry of Health today reported 29 new cases of covid-19 in the community, including five in Waikato.

Speaking at today’s government briefing, Director of Public Health Dr Caroline McElnay said seven of the new cases in Auckland were yet to be linked to earlier cases, all of the Waikato cases were linked.

Yesterday, the death of a 57-year-old man from covid-19 was reported, along with 39 new cases in the community. Nine of those were in Waikato.

There have now been 22 cases in Waikato in the current outbreak.

One previous community case has been reclassified as under investigation, bringing the total cases in the outbreak to 1448.

There were also two cases detected in MIQ reported today.

7000 receive drive-through dose
But the recent six-day vaccination event at Vodafone Events Centre is being hailed a success after 7000 people received a drive-through dose.

Among them, many church members of the Assemblies of God Church of Sāmoa who know first-hand the harsh reality of the virus.

A father of seven who lost his battle with covid yesterday was a deacon at the church, and his wife is also in hospital with the disease.

Church spokesperson Jerome Mika said the community was grieving.

He said many members had been vaccinated at the drive-through event in the past few days which was a success due to the many community groups that had supported it.

“Community willingness to be able to just support and encourage their family members to come and get vaccinated.”

The experts agree.

Māori and Pacific leaders a must
Victoria University of Wellington immunologist Diane Sika-Paotonu said to be effective, any vaccination campaign must include Māori and Pacific leaders.

“They’re not just being called in right at the end to help make things work but rather they’re involved right from the outset at the design stage of any activities, events and interventions that are being planned.”

But one group argues they need the right information for that model to work.

Tamihere also heads the North Island’s Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency.

It is taking the Ministry of Health to court for refusing to hand over health data for all Māori that he said was vital to closing the “dangerous gap” in the vaccination rates.

It sits at just over 57 percent for a first dose compared with 81 percent of Pākehā.

“Tai Tokerau is way behind, the Bay of Plenty is way behind. These are Māori communities. It’s not that they’re stupid and dumb, it’s that they’re poorer and their priorities are different and it takes time to reach them.”

The Ministry of Health said it could not share the data because many of the people were not enrolled with Whānau Ora so officials were not authorised to hand it over.

The ministry will release information today on the most and least vaccinated suburbs in the country.

Yesterday 63,000 people were vaccinated as rates climb again after a month long dip.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A youth-led Pasifika mass vaccination event in Auckland has immunised several thousand people over the past four days.

Pacific health provider South Seas’ youth group Bubble Gum ran a drive-through event called Rally Your Village at Auckland’s Vodafone Events Centre.

The event has resulted in 4542 people being vaccinated — mostly youth and young adults.

South Seas chief executive Silao Vaisola-Sefo said it was successful because it was community-driven.

He said they wanted to take people on a journey through the process of getting vaccinated and to create a festival atmosphere.

Minister of Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio said the numbers were impressive.

“A huge congratulations, absolutely proud of the leadership of the Bubble Gum group in leading that,” he said.

“Their efforts alongside other young people who are leading the charge are probably responsible for the huge uptake in the covid-19 vaccine for that age group.”

More than 5000 food parcels, petrol vouchers, 2000 kids packs, and NZ$100,000 worth of incentives were distributed to those attending.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A Pasifika local government politician in New Zealand, the first from Kiribati to be elected to political office, has appealed to “Pasifika friends and family” to get vaccinated now as part of the national covid rollout.

Victoria Short, deputy chair of Auckland’s Hibiscus and Bays Local Board, says not to wait.

“If you are waiting for your personalised invitation to get vaccinated, you might be waiting forever, as it may never come,” she said in a statement.

“The time to get vaccinated is right now.”

Short, a 30-year-old mother of two, said she had seen first-hand how the delta variant had affected island families after it swept through the Pasifika community in Warkworth, north of Auckland.

“The current delta outbreak is disproportionally affecting our Pasifika community, who are vaccinating at a much slower rate than most other ethnicity groups,” Short said.

“Complex family and social structures, such as our Pasifika people making up a significant portion of our essential workforce, on average having larger households which are often multi-generational, and us being such a social vibrant people are all ingredients which allows covid to thrive and spread.”

Fully vaccinated
Short herself is now fully vaccinated and is an active Pasifika community representative in the covid-19 response planning led by the Ministry of Pacific People and the Ministry of Health.

“Wonderful work has been achieved by MPP [Ministry of Pacific People] in delivering culturally appropriate messaging to our community on the need for coming forward for a vaccination.

“Also, I have received fantastic feedback from numerous families in Pasifika community regarding the vaccination clinics, with someone even telling me, it was like going back to the islands for half-hour.”

However, the problem was that even with the significant resources and planning that had gone into the vaccine rollout programme, Pacific People were still one of the lowest vaccinated ethnic groups in New Zealand.

“If you haven’t been vaccinated yet, don’t wait a day longer. There are drive-through vaccination centres, clinics and pharmacies throughout the country ready and waiting to stick the needle in your arm.

“Current drive-through vaccination centres in Auckland also don’t require a booking and have more than enough supplies to accommodate everyone.

Collective action
“We are a smart, kind, generous, hard-working people, and now is the time to demonstrate this to the rest of New Zealand through our collective action,” Short said.

“When you take yourself to get vaccinated, make sure you load up the car with everyone else in your bubble over 12 years old, whether they are documented or not.

“The best thing we can do for ourselves, our community and New Zealand right now is to get vaccinated.”

“It’s up to us to take action for our health and the health of the loved ones around us.”

More than 65 percent of eligible people in New Zealand have now been vaccinated in the national rollout — half of those so far with double shots.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A Māori political leader has branded opposition neoliberal ACT leader David Seymour’s act this week undermining an indigenous response to New Zealand’s covid-19 pandemic as  “unbelievably irresponsible and cruel”.

Seymour publicly shared a priority vaccine code for Māori so that Pākehā, or non-Māori, could jump the queue for vaccinations against the virus.

“Political differences aside, it’s hard to understand why a leader with whakapapa continuously chooses not to protect it,” said Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, co-leader and whip of Te Pāti Māori.

Writing in The New Zealand Herald today, she said there had been early signs of inequities in the government’s covid vaccination rollout for Māori and Pasifika.

She cited health specialists arguing that the government’s one-shoe-fits-all vaccine rollout was an “overwhelming failure”.

The failure resulted in “just 19 percent of eligible Māori [being] vaccinated by the end of Tuesday, compared to 30.4 percent of eligible people in the ‘European or other’ category,” Ngarewa-Packer wrote.

Fifteen percent of New Zealand’s population 5 million are Māori, the country’s First Nation people.

‘Conscious decision to sabotage’
“This is where David Seymour made a conscious decision to sabotage. He not only underestimated the manaaki our Māori hauora [health] providers have for everyone in their communities, but also the solutions to address vaccination disparity and the success that came with it.”

The very centre that Seymour had launched a full-scale attack on had a vaccination uptake of 85 percent Pākehā, vaccinating five times fewer Māori than non-Māori.

“His poor understanding that a Māori-targeted-approach is not anti-Pākehā, exclusive or segregated shows his absolute desperation to compete for the ‘disillusioned white’ voter,” Ngarewa-Packer said.

“He launched a political missile that fast became a political SOS.”

Ngarewa-Packer said she was just 12 months out of personally leading a covid response and standing up iwi checkpoints.

“I appreciate how much effort logistically and mentally goes into leading a response effort,” she said.

“It takes a team who is prepared to work outside of normal hours to serve their community and one who believes with a passion that they must, and indeed can.

Poor vaccination uptake
“Our pāti [political party] with many other leaders, continually raised concern with how poor vaccination uptake was for Māori [and Pasifika].

“With a third of our population living in poverty and a third under-employed, the luxury of fuelling a car to travel five hours for vaccination versus putting food on the table was not an option.

“I live in a community where many don’t own smartphones or have data access to book vaccinations, some can’t afford to travel over an hour to their closest urban medical facilities.

“Access issues for many whānau are real, as are inequities. But the reality is Seymour’s neighbourhood is vastly different to those he attacked.’

Seymour is MP for Epsom in Auckland, one of New Zealand’s wealthiest electorates, and has been leader of the rightwing party ACT since 2014.

“He is privileged, and rather than empathise to understand some very real-life challenges, he instead chose to appeal to the fascist New Zealander, to the wealthy who have health insurance, to the 35 percent who no-showed to appointments, to the very elite who designed this vaccination system.”

Ngarewa-Packer said the access code had nothing to do with skin colour but rather the systemic issues that Māori “consistently confront as a population – with higher rates of deprivation and mortality”.

Always considered expendable
“And sadly, it doesn’t matter how hard we work to protect the team of five million or put others before our own. The sad reality is, when it comes to addressing our own needs, it is presented as preferential. We are always considered expendable.”

Ngarewa-Packer also referred to the sacrifices that the famous Maori Battalion had made for the protection of the people of Aotearoa during both World Wars.

“The Māori Battalion was a formidable fighting force, highly regarded for all they did on the allies’ frontline to protect our nationhood. Their sacrifice for us is forever treasured.”

That sacrifice had been hoped that it would “give us full respected rights alongside Pākehā, as [the 1840 foundation] Te Tiriti [of Waitangi] intended”.

All covid-19 vaccinations are free in New Zealand.

15 new community cases
RNZ News reports that Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield reported 15 new community cases of covid-19 in the country in New Zealand today.

Speaking at today’s media conference, Dr Bloomfield said there were now 855 cases in the current community outbreak and 218 cases were deemed to have recovered.

There were 21 new cases reported yesterday, and 20 on three days in a row before that.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

When the Polynesian Panthers (PPP) activist group began calling for an apology for the Dawn Raids two years ago, we went into the process with eyes wide open. Government lobbyists seldom get everything they ask for, but our intent was honest and real and fuelled by our Panther legacy and love for the people.

We believe that the apology was, and is, a necessary step towards the healing and restoration of trust and relationships between the Pacific peoples and families who were adversely affected by government actions during the Dawn Raids and the Aotearoa New Zealand government.

The prime minister’s emotional ritual entry into Auckland’s Great Hall and her address to Pacific people and communities assembled there last Sunday drastically relived the shameful and unjust treatment of Pacific peoples by successive governments during the Dawn Raids era of the 1970s, when police, hunting for immigrant overstayers and armed with dogs and batons, would burst into the homes of Pasifika families in the early morning hours.

These experiences and the subsequent deportations have created layers of intergenerational shame and trauma for Pacific victims and families in New Zealand and in the homelands. Studies have since shown that Pacific people made up only 30 percent of the overstayers, and yet almost 90 percent of the deportations.

The bulk of the migrants who overstayed their visas were from the US and UK. Since the apology was announced there has been a flood of victims’ stories –- stories no longer silenced by the guilt, shame and trauma of the raids and random checks.

What was missing from Sunday’s apology was a list of concrete actions the government will take in addressing the injustices. Instead, what was delivered were four “gestures”: some national and Pacific scholarships, and two other educational “gestures” that were really already in place — a publication about experiences of the Dawn Raids and the provision of resources to those schools already teaching about them.

Why has the government remained silent about setting up a legacy fund to allow education about the Dawn Raids — as requested in the petition signed by more than 7000 people and presented to Parliament by Josiah Tualamali’i and Benji Timu — to prevent future generations of New Zealanders from carrying out the same or similar racist actions?

Educate to Liberate
The only programme currently addressing this is an unfunded one run by the PPP for 50 years and more specifically for the past 10 years with their Educate to Liberate programmes in schools.

This was a far cry to what the Panthers were calling for.

In its submission for healing and restoration to the government in May, the Panthers were clear about what they wanted: an apology as well as 100 annual scholarships, and the overhaul of the current educational curriculum to include the compulsory teaching of racism, race relations, the Dawn Raids and Pacific Studies and the significance of the Treaty of Waitangi as the cornerstone of harmonious race relations in Aotearoa New Zealand, across all sectors, and assessed as “achieved standards” across appropriate non-history subjects.

If what we Panthers called for was granted and acted on, it would provide a clear message to all Pacific peoples and communities and to all New Zealanders that the government was ready for a truly liberating education and a world-leading pathway to the best race relations — Kiwi-style — in the world.

Alas, what the apology delivered was a watered-down version of what the Panthers called for. By perpetuating a myopic view of our long-term educational needs, the short term gestures outlined in the apology will not be enough to grow a truly liberated and informed youthful leadership for the future.

This oversight suggests a rocky future for the New Zealand government and the va (the social and sacred spaces of relationships) with Pacific peoples. The Polynesian Panther demands to annihilate racism in New Zealand might seem too revolutionary and drastic, and will probably fuel anti-Pacific sentiments, but is this really the absolute maximum that the government can do?

What we were given in this apology did little to dismantle systemic racism. Much more work needs to be done to decolonise and re-indigenise our education system. Why is the teaching of the Dawn Raids only optional and not compulsory? The Panthers platform of peaceful resistance against racism, the celebration of mana Pasifika and a liberating education is as relevant now as it was in the era of the Dawn Raids.

If the changes the Panthers have fought for over the last 50 years don’t materialise, then we have no alternative but to — as Māori scholar and activist Ranginui Walker puts it — “ka whawhai tonu matou [we will continue the fight]”.

Dr Melani Anae is a foundation member of the Polynesian Panthers and an associate professor and director of research at the Centre for Pacific Studies, Te Wananga o Waipapa, University of Auckland. Her books include The Platform: The Radical Legacy of the Polynesian Panthers (2020), Polynesian Panthers: Pacific Protest and Affirmative Action in Aotearoa NZ 1971–1981 (2015), and Polynesian Panthers (2006). This article first appeared in The Guardian and has been republished here with the author’s permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz