"Merepeka Raukawa-Tait a champion for the people"

This past weekend we celebrated the exceptional milestone that is the 75th birthday of Merepeka Raukawa-Tait.

Since our inception ten years ago, the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency has had Merepeka at the helm as our Chair. Merepeka has an impressive resume including being a small business owner, former CEO of Hospice West Auckland and former CEO of the NZ Women’s Refuge. The latter two positions made Merepeka the ideal Chair as she had first-hand experience with whānau who were on the knife edge, one exiting this world and the other trying to rediscover the new world.

When you come armed with those experiences alongside a background in politics and board memberships, your ability to sniff out the nonsense is high and she has done a remarkable job during some extraordinarily difficult times. Many whānau were already in struggle street so adding weather disasters, COVID and cyclones on top of that along with the normal criticism aimed at an organisation like ours, your Chair needs to be resilient and made of steel. Fortunately for us, Merepeka is both.

Throughout her lifetime Merepeka has been, either directly or through her parents, witness to incredible events like the beginning and ending of several wars, the Berlin wall go up and get torn down, man land on the moon, the invention of the internet, our first female Prime Minister, terrorism, natural disasters and a life changing pandemic. When you look at that timeline in the 75 years she has lived, it’s incredulous what she came through and how much was achieved in that generation.

Then there are the years of personal experiences Merepeka has appreciated since she was born in Feilding seven and a half decades ago to a Māori mother and father of Irish Catholic ancestry. Merepeka describes her childhood with her two sisters as, “a very Pākehā upbringing”, something many Māori can relate to when born into mixed race unions.

Merepeka also credits her late mother for being a very powerful influence on her telling her to always think for herself and empowering her with the wisdom that wahine can do anything. This was never more evident two years ago when Merepeka entered and won Miss Te Arawa aged 73, something she describes as being one of the best experiences of her life.

In a corporate world that is predominantly led by middle to upper class white men, Merepeka challenged the glass ceiling for decades, sitting at many boardroom tables refusing to back down when it came to Māori – especially women and children. And whilst this has been met with some unwarranted criticism and skepticism, Merepeka remained resolute.

Ten years ago we started Whānau Ora with nine collectives and currently we have 13, a figure that is dictated to by our primary funding which, despite all of our results, never gets just recognition. Demand has steadily risen for the work we do throughout Te Ika-a-Māui, however to create a bigger collective we need more funding, a lot more. Merepeka ensures our successes on the frontline are always acknowledged and endorsed throughout business, political and media sectors while campaigning on our behalf, all for the betterment and wellbeing of whānau.

Unfortunately Māori have the mindset that whatever they have is as good as it is going to get. They are used to going without, used to being at the back of the queue and having others jump ahead of them. That mindset is slowly but surely changing with the advocacy of strong leaders like Merepeka especially on the ground in her hometown of Rotorua.

Merepeka is not a bougee Māori who makes speeches from a high rise office, she walks the streets with no cameras around and always fronts up when times get tough. I thank Merepeka for her excellent leadership in a world that does not always mirror her compassion, yet she continues to work tirelessly for the downtrodden.

Merepeka is a natural champion of the people who never backs down for what is right, her unwavering advocacy strengthens our foundations and we would look very different without her.

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John Tamihere is president of Te Pāti Māori. He is a former Labour Government Minister and chief executive of West Auckland urban Māori Authority Te Whānau o Waipareira and the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency.