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Download AudioMāori leaders have called on political parties to stop using race baiting as an election strategy.
The group, which includes Dame Naida Glavish, Tā Mark Solomon, former MP Tukoroirangi Morgan and Manukau Urban Maori Authority chair Bernie O’Donnell, say the dog whistling and the outright public displays of racism from political candidates have increased to unacceptable levels.
They say it’s racist to call for Māori, elite or not, to be cut out and buried, it’s racist to abuse wāhine Māori at candidate debates for speaking te reo, and it’s ignorant to call the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi a ‘wee experiment’ and then seek to rewrite it in your own words.
Dame Naida says she was raised by her grandmother that if you don’t correct what is wrong, you will become like it.
“What we have in this country is a trillion dollar industry since the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi based on the misery of our people, but that’s not enough for them. They don’t only want us to be miserable because of their act. They also want us to be totally colonised and be brown tauiwi like them, That is not going to happen,” Dame Naida says.
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