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Joseph Parata Hohepa Hawke 1940 – 2022
Joe Hawke, the Auckland builder whose biggest project was rebuilding his tribe and securing its future, died on Sunday at the age of 82.
Mr Hawke came to national prominence in 1977 when he started a 506-day occupation of Tākapawaha-Bastion Point to prevent it from being developed for expensive housing by the Muldoon National Government.
The action divided Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei but gave a focus to many young activists fired up by the 1975 Māori Land March, for which he was part of the organising group.
It was in connection with the Land March that Mr Hawke was arrested for collecting seafood for a hui, leading to him becoming the first person to lodge a claim with the newly-formed Waitangi Tribunal.
While that claim for customary fishing rights in the Waitemātā Harbour was unsuccessful, in 1985 when the tribunal’s jurisdiction was extended back to 1840 he was back on behalf of Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei to file the first historical claim.
The Tribunal’s 1987 report recommended the return of land to Ngāti Whātua, and the next year the government agreed.
Joe Hawke entered Parliament in 1996 as a Labour list MP and served two terms.
The words from 1853 of Joe Hawke’s ancestor Apihai Te Kāwau, quoted in the Ōrākei Report, could have been about his descendant 170 years later –
The clouds in yonder horizon
Across the sea, are playing with
The winds, whilst I am here
Yearning and weeping for my son–Ah ! he’s
More than a son to me ;
He’s my heart’s blood.
Nō reira e te tōtara haemata i te wao nui o Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei, moe mai, moe mai, moe mai rā.
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