Ae Marika!
A column published in the Northland Age
By Hone Harawira
MP for Tai Tokerau
17 March 2009

It’s All About Whanau

I was down the Kaitaia Courthouse the other day to support a couple of my nephews – the Popata boys who got arrested at Waitangi and charged with assault on the Prime Minister John Key - and I wasn’t alone. Seemed there were heaps of the whanau down there for the same reason, and since then, the media’s been buzzin’ around wanting to know why I was there.

John and Wikatana Popata ain’t angels – but then who is? But they do come from a whanau with a deep and abiding commitment to Kaupapa Maori. I have watched these boys grow to young men over the past ten years, and I’ve been impressed by the sincerity and the passion that they bring to the activities that they are involved in, for their marae, their hapu, their iwi, and for Maori people generally.

Sure, sometimes that passion spills over, and sometimes that leads to actions that society might frown upon, but with my record, who am I to criticise? I can recall with distinct clarity putting myself outside the norm and often outside the law to promote ideas and beliefs that we were passionate about when we were young (once upon a time!), and I don’t regret any of it – not for one second.

And even in more recent times, I was happy to organise this country’s biggest ever protest, the 2004 Foreshore and Seabed March, and I note that that was conducted largely outside the law as well. Tens of thousands of people marching the length of the country, massive disruption in all the main centres and a near shut-down in Wellington for a whole day, and all done without any permits from the local councils, the police or the Ministry of Transport.

And yet for all that, no-one got arrested, history was made, a political party was born, and I ended up in parliament.

I know that as an MP, people think that perhaps I shouldn’t be turning up to court to support a couple of young men who have been charged with assault on the Prime Minister but these are not just any two young men, and this was not just any assault.

I’m not sure what the ruling of the court will be, but I do hope common sense prevails, and everyone comes out with a better understanding of what took place that day, and why.

ENDS

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