Waatea News Column: Winston’s indigenous folly
Winston’s remarkable claim that Māori are not indigenous because DNA tests them back to China and mythical Hawaii-iki is not only startling in its ignorance, it is being said at a politically charged moment that demands questions of Winston’s leadership.
New Zealand First’s flirtation with conspiracy groups for votes hasn’t guaranteed NZ First the 5% threshold they need so Winston seem to have turned to race baiting to ensure he gets returned to Parliament.
But is such a tactic acceptable?
Winston knows how inflammatory he is being and how wonky his argument is. His position rests on a belief that Māori living here for 800 years isn’t long enough to be called indigenous.
The argument is weak and flimsy and flies in the face of most academic definitions and understandings of ‘indigenous’.
Winston knows all this, but he simply doesn’t care. He will push any crazy barrow that generates extra votes when he needs every vote he can get.
If that means peddling a false narrative about Māori and then damning Māori for that false narrative to win, he will.
I don’t believe that type of political malice should be rewarded at the ballot box.
I know it’s not a popular opinion, but I think there’s every chance NZ First might just come in under the 5% threshold.
I think New Zealanders are better people than NZ First strategists believe they are.
First published on Waatea News.
Winston Peters succeeds simply by enraging people and being talked about. And that is what he seeks to accomplish.
Everyone fell into his electioneering trap.
Winston has not covered him self in glory for a long time, and as Martyn alludes to–he is hard bitten and cynical–perfect character attributes for his brand of politics.
He could have retired with dignity after Foreign Affairs and Provincial Growth Fund achievements but no, he penned a letter to the Governor General knifing PM Jacinda Ardern prior to the 2020 election.
And now he takes this incomprehensible, and indefensible position on Māori people, who he walks among in Te Tai Tokerau when he is at the Peters family enclave at Whananaki beach. It won’t just be Māori bollocking him for such a cowardly tactic either if he shows his face up North before or after the election.
Half the country seems to be down there own personal rabbit hole at the moment so even veteran politicians are not immune from MAGAism it seems.
Winston could have achieved so much but at the end of his time he will be remembered for the Gold Card and as a failure .
100% Trevor.
He saved us from a 4th term Key/English government and that ain’t nothing. Also deserves credit for acting as a handbrake on Labour’s woke lunacy for a time.
But yes you are basically right.
Nothing wrong with being Chinese. Persian or Greek could be cool too. With Luxon looking like one of the mad Pirates of Penzance, Hipkins mea culpa-ing for all his hapless predecessors, Seymour’s dirty little bill boards, and the Greens belatedly discovering that they’re an environmental party, perhaps it’s time to limit all electioneering to kissing a couple of hundred babies each, or just staying mute and planting trees…indigenous of course.
Indigenous can be defined in a few ways–sociological and scientific are but two ways. but as the first inhabitants of this country, Maori have the right to use it. Unfortunately, every election Winstone rolls out his novelty act and spews out vitriol in a bid for recognition and the baubles.
Let’s face it, Winston has had his day, and NZF no longer relevant. One last rabbit out of the hat? No, dont think so. Most voters now see through his attempts to get the party tick. And denying Maori indigenous status on the basis of DNA and the obvious fact they arrived here from somewhere else in the Pacific long long ago is pretty desperate; although its not beyond possibility that the media have taken him ‘out of context’, yet again. Noone other than Winston really knows what he means. But his political intentions are clear to see. And, let’s be honest, not like he’s the only politician who panders to the popular vote.
I consider our Maori citizens to be our indigenous people.
Same here
Firstly, the word indigenous means “(of people) inhabiting or existing in a land from the earliest times or from before the arrival of colonists”. https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/…/indigenous
Yes, a lot of people will say Moriori were the first settlers, but Moriori originated from Māori settlers around 1500. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moriori
Winston has got it wrong and it is disgusting that he needs to stoop to seeking through racial divide people, my position is clear as was Dame Whina Cooper’s “One Country, One people”.
I agree with you. Thank you.
Send Winston to China from where he says he can trace his patrimony, and he can go with a totara trunk and spend his time carving up that in an attempt to be like the great Inia Te Wiata. That will keep him quiet and doing something useful if he is determined to chisel us down to something peculiar to his own mind.
15%+ on the night. He’s mopped up the freedom vote… now labour voters can see they are stuffed pick up more votes from them to throttle back nat and act
And now he’s mowing down act.. peerless
Long live the king.
Winston is just out rednecking crACT..all good..to split the votes up.
winston is playing for a slice of the dis-affected vote – total debasement but hey – all is fair in love and war. this is winstons love – dripping down your face.