Members of Te Pāti Māori perform a haka in front of the Act MPs. Photo / Adam Pearse
By RNZ
Te Pāti Māori and the Act Party are claiming victory over the response to a video from Thursday’s Treaty Principles Bill debate that has gone viral.
The video, of Te Pāti Māori MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke performing Ka Mate at the bill’s first reading, as well as her subsequent suspension from the House, has been picked up widely by international media.
Spinoff editor at large Toby Manhire told RNZ’s Midday Report the video had been viewed about 700 million times so far.
While his assessment was not scientific, there’s one version that Whakaata Māori (Māori Television) shared which has had 338m views “which is pretty remarkable”, he said.
TikTok has been gathering the biggest number of views but it was also being shared on a variety of international news websites as well as Instagram.
“It’s everywhere including German and Spanish and Italian sites. It’s quite interesting watching [Speaker] Gerry Brownlee looking like a disappointed headmaster in German and Spanish and in sorts of different captions.”
The video had introduced Māori culture to many different international audiences.
“I think one of the reasons that it’s being shared so much is that what we know and maybe not everyone in the world knows is there’s that incredible impactful visceral power of kapa haka so you see something like that, it’s new and unusual but also incredibly powerful,” Manhire said.
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi said the response to the video, particularly from indigenous peoples from other nations, had been supportive.
“People all over the world, indigenous peoples all over the world, are being given the permission but also the strength to be able to stand. And we all stand together against colonial settler-type thinking and systems that continue to oppress our peoples,” he said.
Not all of the online response has been in Te Pāti Māori’s favour, but Waititi said Maipi-Clarke, Parliament’s youngest MP, had been wrapped in support since Thursday.
“The treasures of our iwi and our people are our babies, are our mokopuna, and our pakeke, our elders. That’s just a natural thing for us to do, we don’t leave them out there for the wolves to eat them,” he said.
Act leader David Seymour, however, believed the incident had made New Zealand look bad on the world stage.
“To the rest of the world, and the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders, it just looks ridiculous. You’ve got one person putting up a reasoned debate and inviting a response, and then you’ve got people that dance around doing a war dance, hurl personal insults, and ultimately get kicked out of Parliament. We’ve got to take a reality-check here, that behaviour is totally unacceptable,” he said.
However, Seymour said it had generated interest and support for his bill.
“It’s clearly driving people to take an interest in the topic, which I regard as a really important milestone. It’s a discussion New Zealand needs to have.”
While Maipi-Clarke had been “named” by the Speaker for disorderly conduct, Seymour did not rule out taking further action against Te Pāti Māori.
“Any member of Parliament can write to the Speaker and raise a matter of privilege, the fact one member has been named doesn’t stop that from happening. However, if it was myself, or knew of another member writing such a letter, I’d be following the Speaker’s rulings, which suggests that such a move should not be publicised before the fact.”
Seymour was also starting to cool on his interest in meeting with the organisers of an anti-Treaty Principles Bill hīkoi when it reaches Parliament today.
He had initially said he would consider meeting with organisers, as an opportunity to discuss and communicate.
Organiser Eru Kapa-Kingi has said he has no interest in meeting Seymour, saying such a meeting would be pointless.
Seymour said that was an exclusionary approach to life and politics.
“It seems to me that based on the Māori Party’s behaviour last week, it’s unclear if there’s a lot to be gained through constructive dialogue.”
Waititi was unsure whether supporters of the hīkoi would be allowed into the public gallery on Tuesday, after the Speaker made the rare move of ordering the gallery cleared after Thursday’s haka.
“The Westminster system has to change. Aotearoa has to change to ensure that it incorporates its tangata whenua and its tangata Tiriti, and that’s what we’re working to.”
Te Pāti Māori MP tells how she was handed the bill to rip up.