I’m gonna tell my Māori Party story in a thread. Mostly, to help me structure why I’m finding it so emotionally challenging to not support them, but also why I’m struggling to support them currently. In 2014, I was at the point of not voting at all. But then I write a post about how the Māori Party were the closest aligned to my values at that time. For those who don’t know, I didn’t have a lot of confidence in te Ao Māori, because I mostly grew up in a different world.

In my view, the Māori Party should have centred its campaign on the mana motuhake policy and rather than trying to address every possible issue affecting Māori, it could have focused on the policy positions it supported / opposed through position papers. #maoripol Still trying to get my head around the full details, practicalities and implications but smaller parties would in my opinion do better to focus on their core driver until they have a big enough membership / core base support to branch out. The Greens are an example of this…

KD was predictable and slightly too long for a stump, MKK was succinct and to the point, BTK straight up oppositional to all but visibly reading his stump #Decision2020 #thehui #maoripol I understand that candidates must demonstrate their connection to the people they are seeking to represent, but it’s off putting hearing them centring themselves in their stories / replies #thehui #Decision2020 #maoripol

Nanaia Mahuta incredibly seasoned and clear in her communications #TheHui #MaoriPol Donna Pokere-Phillips is right to resist being held to account for previous Māori Party decisions. But it’s natural for the questions to be asked and preparation for them is key #TheHui #MaoriPol

Based on the first segment, I want all 3 in parliament! What a great team that would be for Tāmaki. #TheHui #MaoriPol So great to see them all tautoko each other while highlighting their unique points of difference and focuses. Am super surprised at JT - what a positive contrast in performance compared to the mayoralty race!

Hell yes to SEZ!!! I prefer LEAP and have written about them but SEZ is a step toward and something I’ve been so keen to see more kōrero on 🙌

https://twitter.com/TheSpinoffTV/status/1299168731914936321

✊🏼✊🏽✊🏼

https://twitter.com/Ellipsister/status/1280795779527921669

Umm… This is terrible form, if PAK College is in the cluster. Also, if personal interest, my twins go to this school, so a little panicked, if it’s true.

My personal preference is to have the option to change at each general election. BUT I actually do think Nick Smith made a valid point about pol parties pushing roll switching to bolster marginal seats etc

https://twitter.com/NewshubPolitics/status/1287110128777326592

I get he made the point and voted against because he knew National would not likely benefit from it. However, it would 💯 not surprise me for Labour to use that tactic in their campaign strategy in a marginal seat.

Just saw yet another position that required in addition to the full job spec, fluency in te reo and expertise in tikanga. I’ve raised this before but have a couple new thoughts. Firstly, any job that tells Māori they need fluency to engage their people can get in the sea… this is 100% the kind of framing that makes the more than 85% of non-reo speaking Māori lose confidence in engaging their culture in a prof capacity. Secondly, tikanga expertise is reserved for those raised to be tohunga in their whaānau, hapū, iwi…

Just planning an ecosystem in my head for creating a Māori SEZ and it’s 100% in pictures at this stage. I daydreamed once - and it’s gonna sound ridiculous - that I purchased Westfield in Manukau, and expanded across the whole block including from McDs to MIT and created an SEZ right there. Turned the mall into a massive cultural centre selling only indigenous made goods/services…

I went through each of the APEC economies to check some numbers, and found out that all but one (South Korea) have indigenous populations (although some aren’t recognised as indigenous by their govt) totalling more than 270m in across Asia Pacific region. Some of the data is out of date, but some common issues include: non-collection of data due to remoteness or lack of political will; and undercounts. If the trajectories in some of those countries are line NZ, then the figure will likely be much higher in reality.

One thing I’ve been thinking about a bit (having gone through some storytelling exercises for other kaupapa I’m working on), is how minor parties do their comms and similarly how Māori have often tended to do their political comms… Whether intentional or not, they make the error of trying to make themselves the hero in the story, and for Māori the tendency is to cast Māori in other parties as the “villains” deflecting from the actual villain in the story: colonisation, racism etc

Random select: Gabon. A central African state comparable in size to NZ. 11.25% of the country is national parkland, and it’s home to ~80% of Africa’s Gorilla population. More than 40 indigenous languages are spoken as a first or second language, the most prevalent is Fang. #TeAo

https://twitter.com/Ellipsister/status/1270317819226320896

I didn’t realise how little I knew about the countries and cultures in Africa. I think I'm gonna go through them one by one before I explore another continent. Fascinating #TeAo

Reflecting on the “Trade Recovery Strategy” Parker & Mahuta spoke time today. As a primer, the three pou are:
1. Retooling support for exporters;
2. Reinvigorating international trade architecture; and
3. Refreshing key trade relationships.
see more here: mfat.govt.nz/en/trade/trade… Thoughts:
1. Still very primary industries focused but Mahuta signalled importance of intersect between tech and primary sector 🙌
2. Indigenous cooperation full potential still to be explored but exciting area 🙌
3. Some interest by Māori productive sector in manufacturing…

I think there is good reason for the Warehouse to stay open - provided it has robust health protocols in place. Why? It has grocery and pharmacy items which help distribute the stock load available across the country (1) Some people and families will be waiting for their weekly/fortnightly/monthly income and haven’t had a chance to prepare for 4weeks in isolation (2)

WFH tips: working off a laptop screen can be really strenuous on the eyeballs. Highly recommend investing in a monitor, if you require extended periods on screen. If you’re more visual with your work preferences, it helps to use an adhesive flip chart and post it’s to help structure your thoughts/planning documents. It also gets you out of your seat to keep your blood flowing.

Top of mind: Elections r not competitions. They r not about 1st/2nd/Winners/Losers etc. Pushing them into competition territory is why we can’t have cohesion. Elections r about citizens deciding the diversity of representation they want to make decisions on behalf of the nation Exhibit 1: The message is stronger without the targeted attack.

I’ve been on and off with my commitment to learning te reo - mostly based around fear of not being able to acquire the language at a fluent level. But Mere Mangu has planted a seed for Ngāpuhi wahine and wahine Māori more broadly and I want to be part of helping it grow Time to dust off all the tools I have already and just make it happen ✊🏼

Me & Pudding ❤️ We bonding 😂❤️

I received a “365 Facts that will scare the s#*t out of you daily calendar” from a Secret Santa. But I’m 15 days in deficit, so will bring y’all up to speed 😂 #ScaryShitFacts Jan 1: If u sneeze hard enough, you can fracture a rib. But try to suppress a sneeze and u might rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and drop dead.

As part of my reflection from my tour to ABQ & Hawai’i, I’ve been thinking about “What is Māori Development” - a development approach for Māori? a Māori approach to development? a combo of both? (1/n) Anyhow, I wrote a short piece on it for my assessment and as part of that process, began delving into the Māori Community Development Act. What I learned, was that the WT found it is the only statute in NZ that recognises the right of Māori to self-govt (2/n)