Audrey Young: Nanaia Mahuta's travel record as foreign minister vs Winston Peters'

Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta has three Zoom meetings with Pacific counterparts planned this week. Photo / Mark Mitchell

OPINION:

There is little doubt that Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta has been missing in action from the Pacific but the more relevant issue is whether Covid has been a legitimate excuse.

It is easy to look at this week's eight-country tour of the South Pacific by China's Wang Yi and compare it to Mahuta's own lonely record of one Pacific trip - to Fiji, in late March.

It is easy to look at the trip made by Australia's new Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, to Fiji last week and see the sense of urgency, spurred by Wang's visit.

But they are unfair comparisons because they were trips made in unprecedented circumstances.

China's initial success in signing up the Solomon Islands to a security deal was followed by an even more audacious bid by Wang to sign up a swathe of Pacific countries to a new strategic agreement across a range of areas – policing, agriculture, trade, medical, education, disaster response.

The Solomons proposal was revealed only via a leak in March and met with horror by those who see it as the thin end of a wedge that could result in a maritime base for China, close to Australia.

The broader proposal for the so-called Common Development Vision was a huge shock and revealed only on Wednesday last week via a leak to Reuters - a proposal not yet accepted by Pacific countries.

It is likely that if the New Zealand Government knew six months ago what they know now about China's ambitions in the Pacific, it would have been a greater priority, even if it had been via Zoom.

Mahuta appears to be in catch-up mode. She had a Zoom meeting with her Solomons counterpart last week and has three more Zoom bilaterals planned this week with her counterparts in Tonga, the Marshall Islands and the Cook Islands.

But Mahuta is not alone in not having ventured far into the Pacific. Covid has kept most Pacific countries closed to regular visitors, and New Zealand ended MIQ only at the end of March.

Only three, Fiji, the Cook Islands and Papua New Guinea are currently open.
Others such as Kiribati and Samoa opened their borders for the special visitor from China.

Accusations that China's proposals would not have gotten off the drawing board if New Zealand, Australia and others had paid more attention to the Pacific are simplistic and almost certainly wrong. Power talks and a flying visit by Wang Yi bearing gifts was always going to raise interest.

Border closure is a legitimate reason not to have visited in person, and New Zealand was playing a big part in helping Pacific countries with what appeared to be their No 1 priority, the Covid crisis.

But as the Pacific opens up, Mahuta has some others to compare herself to in terms of assuming a full travel programme.

Former Foreign Minister Winston Peters put the travel miles behind his Pacific reset last term, making at least 10 visits to the Pacific in 2019, the year before Covid hit the world: Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Cook Islands, Tuvalu, Kiribati and three times to Fiji.

Trade Minister Damien O'Connor, who is now in the United States with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, is now on his sixth overseas trip this term.

Mahuta has made three overseas trips altogether this term, including the one to Fiji in March.

She will be heading to Rwanda for the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in June.

In July she will be heading back to the Pacific Islands Forum, the pre-eminent meeting of the region which assuredly must be her top priority.