December 20, 2023
Reo Māori not taking second place
The chair of Wellington’s Māori language board, Te Kaiwhakapūmau i Te Reo Māori, says any order by Government ministers for officials and departments to cut back on the use of te reo is illegal and should not stand.
Piripi Walker says the language is protected by having official status, so it can’t be pushed back into a secondary position.
“Those voices that have come out, essentially they are a continuation of the old voices of bans, of suppression, marginalisation. They’ve crept out into an election campaign. They’ve been seized on by our political parties as very fertile ground for votes. They’ve always been out there, the anti-Māori view, the one that doesn’t want Māori visibility. It gets very annoyed by a Māori presence or the Māori language being around,” he says.
Mr Walker says even if Māori challenge the moves through the courts, the damage done to the way young Māori see their language could set back its revival a generation.