Respect

Hone Harawira is the elected MP for Te Tai Tokerau, party member of the Maori Party and son of one of the most infamous Maori women in contemporary Maori society. There are pakeha out there who refuse to acknowledge his Maori-tanga and call him John, some kind of symbolic castration of Hone from what he is. A Maori tane.

Hes also whanaunga to me, he is a descendant of Kawiti's line, as am I through my father and his father. I took this picture of him yesterday at Uni, after my class gategrashed his press conference, why he is voting against the new Foreshore and Seabed legislation in spite of a confidence and supply agreement with National.

Lisa, seated next to Hone is my lecturer, she asked him to q and a with us off the cuff, he kindly agreed. As is always the way with Maori, he went round each of us, shook our hands, kiss for the ladies, hongi for the blokes. Then he sat crosslegged on the floor of the Whare like that and spoke candidly. Hone has bad reputation amongst the media fraternity, and white people, he doesn't like'em, because hell, they don't like him. Hone is one of those people who says whatever comes out of his mouth as soon as he's thought it, diplomacy is not his strong suit.

He's a Harawira, tarred and feathered by the association to his mother Titwhai, a woman also wanting for some kind of diplomacy skills, but whom when you look deeper is 100% passionately for the cause of Maori self determination. The Harawira's are activists, Hone's nephews roughed up John Key abit at last years Waitangi. He is always front page news, most recently for saying he didn't want his kids dating Pakehas, he got called a racist. I knew what he meant by it.

One day when Im old, Hone will come to represent a place in history like our forebears, Apirana, Morehu, Ranginui, Pita. Im glad I got the chance (again) to listen to the deliberative, mature tone in his voice, and know that someone is trying to make a true difference.