“It is one of the rare times that Māori have been less impacted by a disease than Europeans and provides a clear example of how much better Māori do when we are able to exercise self-determination and control our own lives.” — Professor Margaret Mutu, on the Māori response to Covid-19 in 2020.
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“Nobody wanted to just go and shut down a road. It was about safety and health in the face of a threat.” — Luke Fitzmaurice, co-author of ‘Stepping Up: COVID-19 Checkpoints and Rangatiratanga’.
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“To the nurses: I can’t understand how you think you could continue to care for my husband with cancer, or a newborn grandchild in a neonatal unit, or visit my aunty’s home to redo her dressing on her leg, if you aren’t vaccinated.” — Joanne Doherty.
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“Even before we’d had a chance to talanoa or discuss what community education sessions could look like, Pasifika were being labelled as ‘likely to be difficult’.” — Dr Api Talemaitoga.
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“Vaccination is a necessary protection against Covid, but dealing with a living history and the ongoing discriminatory actions of the Crown requires more than just an injection in the arm.” — Moana Jackson.
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“We are the people that the restrictions and the mandates exist for. We are the reason why those working hospitals, shops, schools, movie theatres and cafes have to make sure their staff are vaccinated.” — Rangimarie Sophie Jolley.
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“We’re going to have to dig deep to avoid a deeply tragic scenario playing out again and again.” — Tina Ngata.
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“If the government had listened to our experts, and itself, all these months, Māori could have been 90 percent vaccinated by now,” writes Vini Olsen-Reeder, who’s sick of Māori being blamed for being slow to vaccinate.
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“While it is OF COURSE urgent that Māori vaccinate, we can’t overlook the role that this broken relationship and intergenerational neglect and devaluing of Māori life plays in vaccine hesitancy.” — Tina Ngata.
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“It’s been a whole year since we went through this, and yet, here we are again, with mainstream media ignoring, or perhaps not even seeing, the very real damage done by this type of clickbait heading.” — Emmaline Pickering-Martin.
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“The racist decision was not warning us before the suspension happened. The racist decision was not directly addressing the community after announcing it.” — Dr Sapna Samant & Professor Mohan Dutta.
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“It’s deeply painful to consider just how poorly Pacific Islanders are being served by public health agencies here in the US, especially in states where their health data isn’t separated from Asians’.” — Ema Hao’uli.
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“Fear is a powerful thing. It erases whanaungatanga, that relationship and duty that bind us as Māori. In its place, it inserts false logic, slapdash principles, and conspiracies.” — Dr Anthony Jordan.
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“The thing about the big beats of history is that they’re often signs or reminders that we must now reimagine the society we live in. Momentous history requires momentous change.” — Tainui Stephens.
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“The very real life effect of this rumour has been felt by the Pacific community. There have been multiple racist attacks on Pacific peoples online and verbal abuse in person.” — Emmaline Pickering-Martin.
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“Overall, a key issue is the need for the government to provide Māori and Pacific whānau with ‘choice and control’ rather than ‘forced and compulsory’ isolation management.” — Dr Elana Curtis.
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“Predictably, we’ve seen damaging racist views vilifying Pacific communities on mainstream and social media since the family at the centre of the Auckland cluster was first identified as Pacific.” — Dr Collin Tukuitonga.
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“We’re committed to ensuring that Māori hands continue to have a firm grip on all the levers needed to transform our lives — not just on the shovels.” — Te Kāhui Amokura.
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“Labour has bent over backwards to help businesses. But the government must make a priority of being mindful of the people at the bottom.” — Matt McCarten.
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“The distrust many Māori have for police comes from recent and very legitimate places of fear, and it’s rooted in historical racism.” — Irihapeti Edwards & Stephanie Muller-Pallares on what you need to know about the Covid-19 response law.
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“Even with a fair amount of privilege on my side, it was one of the worst, most depressing phases of my life. I now truly believe that our social welfare system isn’t designed to help struggling New Zealanders.” — Victoria Kaihe.
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“Despite well-intentioned health practitioners, the health system provides lower quality care for Māori.” — Dr Papaarangi Reid.
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“If history is anything to go by, I fear any confidence would be misplaced.” — Pounamu Jade Aikman on whether police will apply their Covid-19 powers fairly and evenly.
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“If these leaders succeed in getting things back to our deeply dysfunctional and inequitable normal, I’m sure many of us will be relieved and happy to forget the lesson that this Covid-19 pandemic has provided.” — Dylan Asafo.
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New Zealand’s response to the short-term Covid-19 crisis should guide our response to the long-term issues facing us, writes Kerensa Johnston.
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“When this pandemic started to inch closer around us here in New Zealand, we all began worrying for Che.” — Becky Manawatu, on losing her cousin Che Warren, “one of New Zealand’s most vulnerable”, during the lockdown.
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“The question of authority, how and where it’s exercised, and by whom, is not just an academic one.” — Kerensa Johnston.
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“Millennials are the functional generation in an environment we’re all being forced to occupy: the online world.” — Wiremu Manaia.
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“In a way, Mase was in a bubble long before Covid-19 hit the world and we were forced into our own bubbles.” — Dahlia Malaeulu.
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“In Italy, you kept house, and you kept it clean enough for the pope to visit any day of the week.” — Becky Manawatu.
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