Violent offender says smacking is cowardly

A violent prisoner with links to Cabinet Minister Paula Bennett has emerged as an unlikely champion for the anti-smacking lobby.

Viliami Halaholo, the father of Bennett's granddaughter, is serving time for bashing a man with a fence paling.

In a letter to the Herald on Sunday from prison, he said parents who smack are cowards and the root of New Zealand's violent society.

He said he was "outraged" by footage from the March for Democracy - a protest against the so-called anti-smacking law in central Auckland last weekend.

"Why would any parent want the rights to hit their own children? Discipline?" he said. "More like an act of cowardice and of a bully."

Halaholo is the former partner of Bennett's daughter Ana, and the couple have a daughter.

"I know some people will say that I am scarcely the appropriate candidate to speak up when violence is the prime subject, but on the contrary, I am.

"You see, the so-called discipline smack is what ultimately fuelled my rage."

He is due for release in 2011, and will reappear before the Parole Board next year.

anna.leask@hos.co.nz