Kerrin Leoni: Standing for the top job
“The more we normalise going for the top jobs in this country, the better it is for future generations.” — Kerrin Leoni, Auckland mayoral candidate.
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Author: Dale Husband
Lemauga Lydia Sosene: Standing up for South Auckland
“I learned to fight for the ratepayer dollar. I would say: ‘You need to take more off that side over there (Remuera and the North Shore) and bring it over to the South Auckland side of the ledger.’” — Lemauga Lydia Sosene, MP for Māngere, on her time in the Auckland Council.
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Ngarino Ellis: We draw strength from our art
“Throughout colonisation, throughout everything that’s happening still today, we can draw strength from our art.” — Professor Ngarino Ellis, art historian and co-author of ‘Toi Te Mana: An Indigenous History of Māori Art’.
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Pauline Harris: Looking to the stars
“I always had a picture of Matariki next to my bed when I was growing up. I found it in National Geographic . . . I ripped the page out and put it on my wall, not knowing it would become really important to me later in life.” — Dr Pauline Harris, astrophysicist and expert on Māori astronomy and maramataka.
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Nadine Hura: Oriented to the light
“My book deals with grief and loss, because wherever there is colonialism, there is grief and loss. But there’s also strength, endurance, intelligence, wit, and just really hardworking, hard-case people doing their best in terrible and unjust circumstances.” — Nadine Hura, author of ‘Slowing the Sun’.
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Rhonda Hāpi-Smith: Working inside the wire
“That might have been me but for the good grace of God — and I always walked with that. I was there to ensure that they got back out to their families intact.” — Rhonda Hāpi-Smith, author of ‘Inside the Wire’, on her 20 years in the prison service.
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Jordon Milroy: ‘Wow, I’m the lucky one’
“My cerebral palsy may be severe, but some days I’m the lucky one. I come home to my wife and go: ‘Wow, I’m the lucky one.’” — Jordon Milroy, disability advisor at Canterbury University.
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Michelle Rahurahu: The road to Poorhara
“For me, it wouldn’t make sense to write a story of two Māori cousins in a beat-up car roaming through this country without talking about all these different monuments to the colonial takeover of this land.” — Michelle Rahurahu on her Ockham-winning novel ‘Poorhara’.
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Tui Taurua: Into the light
“Here I am, 68 now, going on 69, and I’m having a vibrant life because I turned to my mātauranga Māori, and I started trusting my voices, and learning what I needed to learn.” — Tui Taurua, on her journey to recovery after 20 years in the psychiatric system.
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Mariameno Kapa-Kingi: Being our strongest Māori selves
“I was drawn to fight for our voice, our thinking, our aspiration, and our issues. I don’t mean that I always want to live in that fighting space, but, unfortunately, that is too often where we are needed.” — Mariameno Kapa-Kingi, MP for Te Tai Tokerau.
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Robert Wiremu: A musical connection
“The idea that something is ‘music’ is a western idea. Music as something that exists on its own without history, or music without story, or music without whakapapa, didn’t happen for us.” — Robert Wiremu on Māori music.
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Joe Mataele: A life less ordinary
“I’m serving people. I’m serving the nation. That really resonated with me — the idea of being able to serve and protect.” — Joe Mataele, the Defence Force’s Person of the Year.
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Karl Chitham: Making space for other artists
“I see the curatorial process as an art practice. I don’t get to make my own work very often. And I don’t like the idea that I’m taking up space that could go to somebody who’s working full time on their toi.” — Karl Chitham.
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Eru Kapa-Kingi: It’s the system that’s radical, not me
“The radical thing is the system that currently exists — a system that completely cuts across the truth that our tūpuna never ceded sovereignty. To me, that’s the radical thing.” — Eru Kapa-Kingi.
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Bruce Jepsen: Let the experts do their job
“I don’t think we’ve even scratched the surface of our ability to educate through a te ao Māori lens. You only have to look at the amazing results in kura kaupapa Māori for the 3 percent of Māori who attend those kura.” — Bruce Jepsen, Te Akatea (Māori Principals Association)
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Ria Hall: If you’re Māori, you’re automatically political
“Pāpā Moana Jackson used to say that if you’re born Māori, you’re automatically political. It’s inherent in who we are and how we roll, irrespective of the careers or the paths that we take.” — Ria Hall.
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Anna Coddington: Always changing
“There was a time when I felt like I was on the outside looking in longingly at the Māori music scene, wanting to be part of it but not feeling like I had the reo or the connections.” — Singer-songwriter Anna Coddington.
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Miki Magasiva: Rhythm and tears
“When I wrote the script, I was going through an emotional time in my life . . . I must have spent, jeepers, three years crying, writing this thing.” — Miki Magasiva, who wrote, directed and produced ‘Tinā’.
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Josephine Bartley: Me and my community
“I love this community, and I want to represent it and make a difference. And I felt that the best way to do that is in a decision-making position as a city councillor.” — Auckland councillor Josephine Bartley.
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Honey Hireme-Smiler: I still have that fire burning
“I came through two very different eras of female sports. I started out in the days when we were running raffle tickets and doing hāngī fundraisers to get us to Auckland to play in the World Cup back in 2003.” — Honey Hireme-Smiler.
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Jason Gurney: A love letter to my dad
“I have the most supportive, loving, wonderful dad ever. He has allowed me to share some of the darkest, most difficult times of his life.” — Dr Jason Gurney on rheumatic fever and his book ‘The Twisted Chain’.
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Anthony Hōete: The future of Māori architecture
“We can dismantle and rebuild the history of architecture. We’re going to change the narrative to one that’s more Māori.” — Anthony Hōete, professor of architecture at Auckland University.
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Aaron Smale: The need to know
“It was quite a fixation for me, even as a kid: wanting to know, wanting to know, wanting to know. Maybe that’s why I’m a journalist, because I was always asking questions, and my parents never had answers, or couldn’t give me answers.” —Aaron Smale.
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Helmut Modlik: We’re building our own rangatiratanga
“All the values our old people gave us to live by enhance the successful pursuit of economic endeavours. Our story has proven that that’s so.” — Helmut Modlik, chief executive of Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira.
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Ariana Estoras: Mātauranga Māori is the first science of these lands
“Over the last 10 years, we’ve really seen our mātauranga Māori having a place as a knowledge system in the wider New Zealand society.”
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Valmaine Toki: A leading light in Indigenous rights
“To an extent, other Indigenous peoples have looked to us for direction, because they see Māori as being pioneers in advocating for our rights. And we have been, but we can do a lot more.” — Professor Valmaine Toki, chair of the UN Expert Mechanism for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
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Professor Jonathan Koea: In good hands
“Academic prowess is one thing, but there’s a whole lot of things that we look for in our doctors and our medical people, and getting the mix right and choosing right is hard and complicated.” — Professor of surgery Jonathan Koea.
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Tina Makereti: Connecting with our better selves
“I think we have to find ways to connect with our higher selves, our better selves, and our love for our people and each other. And for me, that happens through literature, through stories.” — Tina Makereti.
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Kat Kaiwai: A life on the Coast
“I want to change the narrative for the people who live here today. I don’t want them to have to face the same thing as my dad did 60-something years ago, when he finished school and felt he had to move.” — Kat Kaiwai, of Tairāwhiti Contractors, on creating jobs on the East Coast.
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Dr Maxine Ronald: Treating cancer, fighting inequity
“When I was in high school, I was told by a careers advisor that Māori didn’t do medicine, and I stupidly took that on board. I defaulted to what people expected of me, which was to not do well.” — Dr Maxine Ronald, breast cancer surgeon.
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