Cheeky bugger and the squares

By MICHELE HEWITSON

Hone Harawira is somewhere in Northcote. I have written down the instructions, but still manage to get lost. This is not entirely my fault, because when I called him earlier he wasn't sure which road he was on.

So I call his cellphone and he laughs at me, making it quite clear that he thinks I'm a dunce who can't listen to instructions.

We manage to drive right past him. Still on the phone, I say: "Where are you?"

He says: "I'm giving you the fingers."

He really is a cheeky bugger. And, anyway, what a nerve he has casting aspersions on other people's ability to listen to instructions.

By his own admission he's never been very good at doing what he's told - unless the one doing the telling is his mother, Titewhai, or his wife, Hilda. The explanation for these character traits is, of course, that he is a Harawira.

It is hard to imagine Harawira in Parliament. But stranger things have happened under MMP.

He thinks he might be a Tanczos sort of politician, at least when it comes to wearing a suit and tie.

Harawira does not own such a get-up. He wore a tie for his wedding which, on March 30 next year, will be 32 years ago. When he goes to events such as the Maori Sports Awards, he hires a tux.

The idea of this suit-wearing business is one of the things he "hasn't quite come to grips with".

When I phoned Harawira about the possibility of an interview, he said he'd have to get back to me once he knew whether he'd still have a tongue to talk with.

He'd got himself in trouble - which came as no surprise to anyone, least of all him - by calling Maori Party leadership "square buggers" and "dull and lifeless".

Harawira wants to be a candidate, but not so badly that he could resist the opportunity to mouth off.

The next day he had to issue a press release which had the headline "Sorry Boss, says Harawira".

This seemed tongue-in-cheek to me, but Harawira insisted it was perfectly sincere.

I'd jumped in his car to find coffee in Takapuna, and within minutes he managed to drop in a flattering reference to Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia. He then pointed out that he'd got in this flattering reference in record time.

He maintains he hasn't stuffed his chances. He has spoken to Turia, and says she didn't tick him off. He thinks he might be in for a bit of a telling off when he sees her next week.

But he's looking forward to seeing her. Truly, absolutely, "she's one of my favourite people. I'm going to be very, very happy to see her."

He is on his very best behaviour today and hardly argues at all even when we get into a bit of a discussion, instigated by him, on how the media have painted him as, he says, "a raging radical".

In the next breath he says, "I was involved in some quite heavy activism ... " And I say: "So it was your own fault?"

He says, "yeah". And how was that the media's fault? He can concede a point. He does it with a mock glare and a big laugh. "But that was then."

"Then" was when he was up on 36 charges. "One I didn't do."

That, a fracas at Trade Union Hall, was the one he was convicted for. He thinks this is funny and "that doesn't mean I'm admitting I did any of the others".

This might be spoken like a true politician. In truth, he is not at all sure he wants to be one.

He's been in Kaitaia for 20 years. It is "home", and it is where he is chairman of the kura where Hilda is the principal, and chief executive of four radio stations.

Sure, he says, he has reservations, so does Hilda and so do many other people he respects. But "if they're brave enough to let me do the job, I'm confident I can do the job".

Even if it means having to apologise occasionally. He says he has never had any problem saying sorry, not when he means it. No doubt this has a lot to do with the fact that he is Titewhai's son and Hilda's husband.

I had asked whether he ever felt the Harawira name to be something of a burden. I meant in terms of having the expectation of leadership and activism thrust upon him.

He says: "It doesn't matter what we do, she has great expectations. I think she thinks I should be prime minister. If not, at least leader of the Maori Party."

He tells how a teacher once sent home a less than complimentary report about one of Titewhai's youngest, adopted children.

"Mum wrote back, 'Please appreciate the time you have with this very special child'. We were raised to believe we were special."

He would not say that they are friends, exactly.

"I don't know that I am [her friend.] She's the matriarch. She's a special person in my life. It was a lovely upbringing."

It is his mother everybody knows about and asks about, but of his father, who died many years ago, he says a little wistfully: "My Dad was a gentle man. I like to think I have a bit of my Dad in me."

His lovely upbringing, one which most Pakeha probably imagine as a hothouse of radical scheming, he remembers as full of music - his father had speakers in every room in the house so everyone woke up to singing - and animals.

Titewhai is quite dotty about animals and kept, illegally he notes, pigs and chickens in the back yard.

When the kids went off to school she would call the chooks inside to spend the day laying their eggs on the towels she placed on the beds. And there was Buffy the "scungy little mutt" and "when Buffy died we just about had to have a tangi. People don't know these things."

No, they don't. And people no doubt wonder how on earth a Harawira would fit in in Parliament ... supposing, in the first place, that he hasn't opened his mouth and spoiled his candidacy chances.

Then again, if he hadn't, he wouldn't be Harawira, and all he can do is be himself, he says.

Being himself, this particularly well-behaved side of himself, means that he is hugely charismatic, a terrific swearer and as bossy as his mother.

Can he behave, does he think? "Yeah, that's a problem. I've never really been tested in not being the boss. I find it hard taking direction. I have no difficulty taking advice."

I would be sceptical about this claim except for the fact that he had spent a good part of the interview talking about his wife, Hilda. Who is The Real Boss.

Harawira says Hilda picked him up in the Kiwi bar. He had tried to pick her up before. "She told me to piss off." Was she testing him? "No. She was telling me to piss off."

When the Tehiku branch of the party called for nominations, various people said "I nominate Hone".

Then, he says, one kuia stood up and he thought "my God, she's going to nominate my wife, Hilda".

"I had a little chuckle, then I thought, 'shit, everybody will support her'."

They have seven kids and if you ask him what he's proudest of having achieved, he says "my relationship with my wife".


He agrees that up north he and the whanau live in a wholly Maori world. Why on earth would he want to go to Wellington, I ask, he'd have to hang out with all those Pakeha?

"No I wouldn't, why would I?" he says, pretending to be horrified at the thought.

His philosophy is "to do what is right. If it happens to be legal as well, ka pai".

If he does end up in Wellington? "I'm going to be in trouble, aren't I?" That great big grin indicates he'd relish nothing more.