Editorial: Barbara Edmonds’ new appointment another step forward for Pasifika

Mana MP Barbara Edmonds is the Labour Party's new Finance spokesperson. Photo / Mark Mitchell

“When one makes it, we all make it.”

That was the sentiment many in the Pasifika community felt when Mana MP Barbara Edmonds was this week named as the Labour Party’s new spokesperson for Finance.

She follows in the footsteps of Grant Robertson - a hard act to follow, no doubt - but she also creates a new pathway not only for herself but one for other Pacific politicians and those aspiring to be so one day.

She also represents something that was not always evident in New Zealand and overseas - brown women in leadership roles. Brown women in politics.

‘The once impossibly high glass ceiling has been smashed’

Women in politics in general is still a very foreign thing to see in the Pacific region.

In Samoa, for example, other than Prime Minister Fiamē Naomi Mata’afa - the first woman to hold the position in the island nation’s history - there are only a handful of women members of parliament. It is a massive feat in itself.

Pasifika cultural customs, protocol and traditions still very much have the men in the front. The men speaking. The men making the decisions. Women were seen in the back. They were quiet. Not called on for their thoughts or contributions to the family discussions. Just listening. Looking after the kids. Or in the kitchen.

It is simply the way things are and have been done for centuries and generations. It is very much our normal.

But more and more we are seeing this new normal - Pasifika and Māori taking on higher roles in business, education, health, law and politics here in Aotearoa as well as around the Pacific region and other parts of the world.

More Pacific and Māori women in those roles across various sectors - even within the aiga (family) unit - is also now not as abnormal as it once was. Those women are vocal, fierce and not afraid to stand up for themselves. Interruptive even.

The once impossibly high glass ceiling has already been broken, if not smashed.

And more often than not, those women - just like Edmonds, a mum of eight children - are mothers or sisters and daughters still carrying out those duties expected of them, particularly as Pacific women.

This week, we lost a leader and strong Pasifika advocate in Fa’anānā Efeso Collins, who died shortly after taking part in a ChildFund charity fun run raising money to help people in the Pacific Islands.

On the same day he died, Collins took to Twitter (now X) and posted a congratulatory message to Edmonds on her elevation within the Labour Party. Of course, the poignancy of that last message would not be known until a few hours later.

“Proud of your achievements to date and wish [you] well in the Finance role,” he wrote.

It was a simple acknowledgement of a friend’s achievement, but also one of genuine hope for someone who looks like Edmonds to do well.