Pasifika Power - New Zealand's Special Role In The Region

One of the big winners in the election was Apia-born Taito Phillip Field, the Associate Minister for Pacific Islands Affairs, who won by the largest margin of any candidate-16,020 votes in the strongly Pacific Island Mangere electorate. Field had been in the news for all the wrong reasons in the build up to the election. He is being investigated over allegations of conflict of interest for allegedly getting Thai overstayers to refurbish his Samoan and New Zealand homes in exchange for helping them with their immigration problems.

The Pacific Island community in Mangere held meetings to show its support for Field, who is a political trailblazer for New Zealanders of Pacific Islands ancestry.

Up against Field in the election was a political debutante, Fiji-born Neville Wilson. Wilson has been in New Zealand for 10 years, moving there from Suva because he felt "Auckland was a place you could come to and keep in touch with the Pacific."

Neville Wilson, Political Newcomer. (Photo: Samantha Magick)

He contested the election for the United Future Party, saying he was concerned about the "social engineering" occurring in New Zealand, "which doesn't take into account Pacific Island values."

Wilson believes the election result was influenced by the strong showing of the National Party, which doesn't have a history or tradition of ties with Pacific Islanders. "When it became clear that there was a strong possibility of a National Party government it was almost like a chilly breeze went through the Pacific Islands community," he says.

Wilson doesn't expect radical changes in government policies for Pacific Island communities, or towards its Pacific Island neighbors themselves over the next three years. But he says New Zealand's Pacific Island community faces a turning point.

"They'll move beyond getting by to getting ahead, but the election campaign (still) highlighted their vulnerability."

Wilson cites housing and education as perennial issues of concern for the community, but also points to another substantial challenge, "the grappling over some of the fundamentals of their culture," such as remittances and demands on people's incomes.

Statistics from the most recent (2001) census paint a sobering picture:

>> New Zealanders of Pacific Island ancestry earn NZ$381 (US$263) per week gross compared with NZ$554 (US$383) for the total population.

>> High numbers of Pacific peoples receive some form of benefit. Pacific people are less likely to be self-employed.

>> Pacific unemployment is 6.5 percent compared with 2.3 percent forEuropean/Pakeha.

>> Pacific people are young, 39 percent of population under 15 compared with 23 percent for the total population.

This disparity was behind the creation of the Ministry for Pacific Island Affairs, whose mission is to achieve social and economic prosperity for Pacific peoples in New Zealand.

Ministry Chief Executive Officer Fuimaono Les McCarthy has a wide ranging brief, which saw him appear as chief guest at the launching of the Vagahau Niue, or "Mind Your Language" launch in early October. (See separate story in this issue.)

Fuimaono Les McCarthy, CEO. (Photo: Samantha Magick)

The pilot project was launched in response to the findings in the 2001 census that only 12 percent of New Zealand born Niueans could hold an everyday conversation in their mother tongue. Vagahau Niue aims to support the revival and maintenance of the Niuean language in New Zealand.

"It is not far-fetched to suggest that the Niuean language could be lost within a generation as older fluent speakers pass on, leaving an insufficient mass of fluent speakers to provide for the preservation of the language," Fuimaono told the assembled guests.

Fuimaono's ministry is focusing much of its attention on the upcoming Pacific Prosperity Conference in late November. The official literature says the conference aims to "facilitate Pacific peoples' achievement of optimal economic outcomes" and it is part of a longer process.

"We have reached a point where we can take a deep breath and say 'where to from here?' Previously if you were worried about where is breakfast, you're not going to worry about where is Christmas dinner," Fuimaono says. The conference's key themes are: dare to lead, re-think culture, grow skills and talents, create capital, and reach for the stars.

Fuimaono says the "re-think culture" component refers to the fact that Pacific Island culture reinforces family priorities, and involves many calls for family and community contributions. "These demands can be fairly frequent and fairly onerous…We are providing the space to discuss this in a fairly safe environment," he says.

Fuimaono says his ministry's brief stops at the door (of New Zealand). But one area where there is some overlap with the externally-focused Foreign Affairs Ministry is in the area of labor mobility, one of the major issues at the Pacific Islands Forum meeting in late October.

Fuimaono says New Zealand has historically "been a bit more open to Pacific Islanders staying and working here."

"The New Zealand government has taken an active role to have the (Pacific Access Scheme and Samoan) quota filled. "By and large it has been successful, although there have been some problems."

One New Zealander who looks set to buck that trend is Auckland sculptor Tui Hobson. (See separate story in this issue.)

The winner of the Martin Hughes Contemporary Pacific Art Award last year, she received a travel allowance to visit Cook Islands and Samoa, tracing her family links and meeting with Pacific Island carvers.

"I wanted to meet older members of family before they passed on. I've always had issues about where I am from, but part of me feels quite whole in Rarotonga."

Hobson hopes to travel to Tahiti to meet her family there and then eventually to settle in Rarotonga. Like many Pacific Islander New Zealanders, she will always have an affinity for both New Zealand and her island home(s), a foot in all camps.