Social justice – Asia Pacific Report https://asiapacificreport.nz Independent Asia Pacific news and analysis Mon, 23 Feb 2026 22:26:49 +0000 en-US hourly 1 Roger Fowler’s legacy – and the Polynesian Panthers connection https://asiapacificreport.nz/2026/02/24/roger-fowlers-legacy-and-the-polynesian-panthers-connection/ Mon, 23 Feb 2026 22:22:18 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=124132 Polynesian Panther Party Legacy Trust

The Polynesian Panthers met Roger Fowler in the early 1970s when Ponsonby was home to the largest urban Pacific population in Aotearoa.

He helped establish the Ponsonby People’s Union for Survival and ran several much needed community focused programmes like a food co-op, tenant’s rights advice and support.

He was a gifted community organiser deeply committed to social justice. He had a wide field of vision enabling him to see injustice in Aotearoa and injustice overseas are interconnected.

He brought so much light into the world and into the lives of many many people who came within his orbit locally and globally including ours.

He lived his life so others could have theirs.

Manuia lou malaga Roger. Our sincere condolences and aroha to Lyn and the Fowler whanau.

]]> Saige England: if we want to save the planet we need a massive game change https://asiapacificreport.nz/2025/11/14/saige-england-if-we-want-to-save-the-planet-we-need-a-massive-game-change/ Thu, 13 Nov 2025 23:00:16 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=121097 As the world contemplates action over climate crisis at COP30 in Brazil, author Saige England writes that we need to recognise that we don’t need to prop up a dying economic system that flourishes on making some weak and others stronger.

COMMENTARY: By Saige England

I sat in a cafe listening to one man telling another how to get more out of his workers — “his team”, kind of the way people talked about workhorses until some of us read Black Beauty and learned that sentient creatures have feelings, both animals and people.

I hope that people will wake up to the need to unite, to pull together. The best decluttering is decolonising.

Maybe Zohran Mamdani’s win is a sign that will herald a new era, an era when socialists can beat “the money men”. Maybe it’s time when we will all wake up to a different possibility. Maybe other values will be recognised.

COP30 BRAZIL 2025
COP30 BRAZIL 2025

Virtues do not come from wealth. Capital, capitalism (the key is in the word) is a system of exploitation. It was designed by merchants to make some rich and keep others poor. That’s the system.

Maybe you were not taught that? Of course you were not taught that. Think about it.

I listened to William Dalrymple being interviewed by Jack Tame last Sunday and I thought Jack — who I used to respect a lot before he failed to tackle genocide with Israel’s representative for genocide here in Aotearoa — I thought he, Jack, looked like a possum in the headlights when Dalrymple said that Donald Trump had a precursor in Benjamin Netanyahu and called genocide a genocide.

I like to think Jack and others like him (because I have been like them too) will learn to learn about the history of all people and not view history as an inevitable story of winners and losers.

Winners are exploiters
The winners are exploiters and if we want to save the planet we need a massive game change.


The legacy of colonisation.      Video: TVNZ Q&A

Look at the stats of the land that was taken for expansion and how that expansion was used to justify the extermination of one people to prop another people up. The stats, the real statistics show who was there before, show people lived on the land with the land and the waters.

Capitalism is a system of expansion and exploitation. It flourished for a while on slavery and it flourished for a while on settler colonialism, and it flourished for a while on keeping workers believing the story that they were working for greater glory when their take home pay did not equal the value of their labour.

And there is a difference between guilt and remorse. We can learn from the latter. The former, guilt, stagnates, it leads to defence and offence.

We need to recognise that we don’t need to prop up a dying system that flourishes on making some weak and others stronger.

We need to learn to change — those of us who were wrong can admit it and go forward differently. We can realise that the system was designed to make us fail to see the threads that connect all people. We can wake up now and smell the manure among the roses.

Good shit helps things grow, bad shit is toxic contaminated waste that turns things inwards, makes them gnarly.

Monsters are connected
Unfortunately, those who behave like monsters are connected not just to some of us but all of us.

We need to open our minds and our hearts to a different value system. We need to decolonise our senses.

If you defend a bad system because right now you are one of the few on a decent pay scale then you are part of the problem. You are the problem. You have been conned. A system is only fair if it is fair for all people.

Learning history gives us a map said Dalrymple (author of The Golden Road which tells the story of how great India was BEFORE it was stolen by Britain — how that country gave the world numbers and so much more) and we need to learn how the map was drawn.

As someone who reads history to write history, I encourage us all to read widely and deeply and to research so that we do not stop thinking and analysing, and so we can tell wrong from right.

Do not be neutral about wrongs as some historians would suggest. It is more than OK to call a wrong a wrong. In fact it is vital. Take a new lens into viewing history, not the one the masters have given you.

We miss seeing the world if we fail to think about who drew the map, how it was drawn up by men who carved up the world for the Empires intent on creating a golden age by enslaving most of the people to prop up those at the top.

World map’s curling edges
We need to look under the curling edges of the world map drawn up by the exploiter. We need to find the stories of those who were exploited and who had been part of the creation story of this planet before they were exploited.

Those of us who are descendants of colonisers also — many of us — descend from those who were exploited.

The stories of British workhouses, of the system of exile via banishment, of the theft of women’s rights, of the extreme brutal forms of punishment, the stories of the way the top class pushed down and down on the people of the fields and forests and forced them to serve and serve, these real stories are less well known than the myths.

Myths like the story of King Arthur are better known.

Some myths have been created as a form of propaganda. We need to unpick the stories that were told to keep us stupid, to keep us ignorant.

It is time to stop following the trail of crumbs to Buckingham Palace, or at least to see where the trail really leads — to pedophiles who preyed on others, to predators — not just one but many, to people brilliant at reconstructing themselves — creating some fall guys and some good guys and making some people villains.

That story is a lie that protects and processes dysfunction.

Acting on the truth
Blaming one part of the system prevents us from realising and acting on the truth that the whole system is one of exploitation.

This was always a horror story disguised as a fairy story. One crown could save so many poor. The monarchy is not a family that produced one disfunctional person it is the disfunction.

It promotes the lie that one group of people deserve wealth because they are better than another. What a sick joke.

So let’s back away from societies made by men who want to profit from others and get back to nature.

Let’s look on nature as a sister or mother — a sister or mother you love.

Let’s look at the so called natural disasters like climate change. Look at how they have been created by “noble men” and “noble women” and ignoble ones as well. Disasters that can be averted, prevented.

Who suffers the most in a natural disaster? Not the rich.

How do we heal?
So how do we hope and how do we heal? We see the change. We be the change.

I like listening to intelligent insightful people like Richard D Wolff and Yanis Varoufakis:


Mamdani beats the money men.      Video: Diem TV

Personally, for my mental and physical health I’ve been sea bathing, dipping in the sea. I join a group of mainly women who all have stories, and who plunge into nature for release and relief, to relieve ourselves from the debris. Uniting in nature.

I’ve learned that every day is different. The sea is always changing. No two waves are the same and they all pull in the same direction.

We are part moon, part wave, part light, part darkness. We are the bounty and the beauty.
I do have hope that we will all unite for common good. Sharing on common ground. The word Common is so much better than Capital.

If you are working for the kind of people that are discussing how to get more out of you for less, then unite.

And if you know people who are being exploited in any way at all unite with them not the exploiter. Be the change.

By helping each other we save each other. And that includes helping our friend and exploited lover: Nature.

Saige England is an award-winning journalist and author of The Seasonwife, a novel exploring the brutal impacts of colonisation. She is also a contributor to Asia Pacific Report.

]]> Bryce Edwards: Mamdani lessons – NZ left need to catch up with the Zeitgeist https://asiapacificreport.nz/2025/11/06/bryce-edwards-mamdani-lessons-nz-left-need-to-catch-up-with-the-zeitgeist/ Thu, 06 Nov 2025 06:30:42 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=120767 COMMENTARY: By Bryce Edwards

Yesterday’s victory of “democratic socialist” Zohran Mamdani in the race for the New York mayoralty is fuelling debate among progressives around the world about the way forward.

And this has significant implications and lessons for the political left in New Zealand, casting the Labour and Green parties as too tired and bland for the Zeitgeist of public discontent with the status quo.

Mamdani’s startling victory in the financial capital of the world symbolises a broader shift in global politics.

His triumph, alongside the rise of similar left populists abroad, sends an unmistakable message: voters are hungry for politicians who take the side of ordinary people over corporations, and who offer bold solutions to the cost-of-living crises squeezing families worldwide.

The Mamdani phenomenon follows on from some other interesting radical left politicians doing well at the moment, including the new leader of the Green Party in the UK, Zach Polanski. These politicians seem to be doing better by appealing to the Zeitgeist of anger with inequality and oversized corporate power that characterises Western democracies everywhere.

Such politicians and activists are channelling the tone of other recent radicals like Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn, who both embraced a leftwing populism concerned with working class citizens.

Here in New Zealand, however, the contrast is stark, where the political forces of the left are very timid by comparison. The Labour and Green parties remain stuck in the past and unwilling to catch up with the anti-Establishment radicalism, that focuses on broken economic systems.

However, locally some commentators are pushing for the political left to learn lessons from the likes of Mamdani and Polanski.

Simon Wilson: Focus on class, not identity politics
Leftwing columnist Simon Wilson wrote yesterday in The New Zealand Herald that “Labour and the Greens can learn from Mamdani”, pointing out that although the New Zealand left has become overly associated with identity politics, the successful way forward is “class politics”.

Wilson says: “Instead of allowing his opponents to define him as an “identitarian lefty” — and they really have tried — Mamdani is all about the working class.”

In policy and campaign terms, Wilson says Mamdani has been successful by getting away from liberal/moderate issues:

“His main platform is simple. He wants to reduce the cost of living for ordinary working people. And instead of wringing his hands about it, he has a plan to make it happen. It includes childcare reform, a significant rise in the minimum wage, a rent freeze, more affordable housing, free public transport and price-controlled city-owned supermarkets. Oh, and comprehensive public-safety reform and higher taxes on the wealthy.”

Wilson also suggests that the political left in NZ should be focused on the enemy of crony capitalism (also the theme of my ongoing series about oversized corporate power): “It might be corporates, determined to prevent meaningful reform of oligopolistic sectors of the economy, such as banking, supermarkets and energy.”

Such an approach, Wilson suggests dovetails with a type of “democratic socialism” that should be embraced here. As another example of this, Wilson says, is the new leader of the Green Party in the UK, Zach Polanski.

Donna Miles: Kiwi politicians need to push back against corporate capture

On Monday, columnist Donna Miles also wrote in The Press that Zack Polanski and Zohran Mamdani are showing the way for the global left to push back against corporate power. She explains the problem of how corporate power now swamps New Zealand politics, in a similar way to what Mamdani and Polanski are fighting:

“New Zealand faces a parallel plague of vested interests eroding faith in democracy. The revolving door between politics and lobbying creates unfair access, allowing former officials to trade insider knowledge for influence.”

Miles explains the recent success of the new environmental populist leader in the UK:

“The second politician you should know about is Zack Polanski, the gay Jewish leader of the UK Green Party who is of Eastern European descent. Elected last month with a landslide 85 percent of the vote from party members, Polanski’s bold policies on wealth taxes, free childcare, green jobs, and social justice have triggered an immediate ‘Polanski surge’, with membership reaching 126,000, making it the third-largest political party in the UK.”

New Zealand’s timid political left
Leftwing thinkers in New Zealand are viewing the rise of these bold leftwing populists with envy. Why can’t New Zealand’s left tap into the Zeitgeist that Mamdani and Polanski are successfully surfing? Why can’t they concentrate on the “broken economic system” that Mamdani put at the centre of his widely successful campaign?

For example, Steven Cowan has blogged to say “Mamdani’s election victory will be a rebuke for NZ’s timid politics”. He argues that Mamdani’s victory shows “that voters are not allergic to bold politics”, and he laments that the parties of the left here are worried about coming across as too radical.

Chris Trotter suggests that there is a new shift towards class politics occurring around the world, which the New Zealand left are missing out on, saying “Poor old Labour doubles-down on identity politics, just as democratic-socialism comes back into fashion.”

Trotter points out that Labour managed to alienate all their democratic socialists many years ago, and their absence meant that a “new left” took over the party:

“To rise in the Labour Party of the 21st century, what one needed was a proven track record in the new milieu of ‘identity politics’. Race, gender and sexuality now counted for much, much, more than class. One’s stance on te Tiriti, abortion, pay equity and LGBTQI+ rights, mattered a great deal more than who should own the railways. Roger Douglas had slammed the door to ‘socialism’ – and nailed it shut.”

Trotter holds out some hope that the Greens might still avoid being pigeonholed in identity politics:

“The crowning irony may well turn out to be the Greens’ sudden lurch into the democratic socialist ‘space’. Chloë Swarbrick makes an unlikely Rosa Luxemburg, but, who knows, in the current political climate-change, ditching the keffiyeh for the red flag may turn out to be the winning move.”

Taking on corporate capture: Could Chlöe Swarbrick ditch the keffiyeh for the red flag?
The rise of figures like Mamdani and Polanski is not occurring in a vacuum. It reflects growing public recognition of a problem I’ve been documenting in this column for weeks: the systematic capture of democratic politics by corporate interests.

As I’ve detailed in my ongoing series on New Zealand’s broken political economy, our democracy has been hollowed out by lobbying firms, political donations, and the revolving door between government and industry. From agricultural emissions policy to energy market reforms, we see the same pattern: vested interests using their wealth and access to shape policy in their favour, while the public interest is systematically ignored.

Throughout the campaign, Mamdani made it clear who the enemies of progress were. He railed against corporate landlords, Wall Street banks, and monopolistic companies profiteering off essential goods. New York’s economy, he argued, was full of broken markets that enriched a wealthy few at the expense of everyone else – and it was time to take them on.

By naming and shaming the elites (and proudly embracing the “socialist” label), Mamdani gave voice to a public anger that had long been simmering.

Mamdani’s win is part of a broader pattern. Across the world, leftwing populists are gaining ground by focusing relentlessly on material issues and openly targeting the corporate elites blocking progress. Rather than moderating their economic demands, these leaders channel public anger toward the billionaire class and monopolistic corporations.

And they back it up with concrete proposals to improve ordinary people’s lives. This approach is proving far more popular than the cautious centrism that dominated recent decades.

It turns out that a “bread-and-butter” socialist agenda of making essentials affordable, and forcing the ultra-rich to pay their fair share, resonates deeply in an age of rampant inequality. Policies once dismissed as too radical are now vote-winners.

Freeze rents? Tax windfall profits? Use the state to break up corporate monopolies and provide free basic services? These ideas excite voters weary of struggling to make ends meet while CEOs and shareholders prosper.

We’ve seen this new left populism surge in many places. In the United States, for example, Bernie Sanders’ campaigns and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s outspoken advocacy popularised these themes, and recently Chicago elected a progressive mayor on a pledge to tax the rich for the public good.

In Latin America, a string of socialist leaders, from Chile’s Gabriel Boric to Colombia’s Gustavo Petro, have swept to power promising to rein in corporate excess and uplift the masses. The common denominator is clear: voters respond to politicians who offer a clear break from the pro-corporate consensus and speak to their real economic grievances.

Here in New Zealand, the Labour Party and its ally the Greens should have been the vehicle for bold change. But instead they’ve both largely stayed the course. When Labour took office in 2017, there were high hopes for a transformational government. Yet Jacinda Ardern and her successors ultimately shied away from any fundamental challenge to the economic status quo.

They tinkered around the edges of problems, unwilling to upset the powerful or depart from orthodoxy.

Even when Labour admitted certain markets were broken, for instance acknowledging the supermarket duopoly that was overcharging Kiwis for food, it refused to take decisive action. A Commerce Commission inquiry into supermarkets resulted in gentle recommendations and a voluntary code of conduct, but no real crackdown on the grocery giants’ excess profits.

The government balked at imposing windfall taxes on the booming banks or power companies. Its much-vaunted KiwiBuild housing scheme collapsed far short of targets, and it never embarked on a serious state house building program. Time and again, opportunities for bold intervention were passed up. It often seemed Labour was more afraid of annoying corporate interests than of disappointing its own voters.

In the end, the Labour-led government managed a broken economic system rather than transforming it. And during a mounting cost-of-living crisis, “managing” wasn’t enough. By 2023, many traditional Labour supporters felt little had changed for them — and they were right. The party had kept the seat warm, but it hadn’t delivered the economic justice it once promised.

Time to catch up with the Zeitgeist
The contrast between New Zealand’s left and the new wave of international left triumphs could not be more stark. Overseas, the left is rediscovering its purpose as the champion of the many against the few, of public good over private greed.

At home, our left has spent recent years timidly managing a broken status quo. If there is one lesson from Zohran Mamdani’s New York victory — and from the broader resurgence of socialist politics abroad — it’s that boldness can be a virtue for parties that claim to represent ordinary people.

To catch up with the Zeitgeist, New Zealand’s Labour and Green parties will need to break out of their cautious mindset and actually fight for transformative change. That means making our next political battles about the “big guys” – the profiteering banks, the supermarket duopoly, the housing speculators – and about delivering tangible gains to the public.

It means having the courage to propose taxing wealth, curbing corporate excess, and rebuilding a fairer economy, even if it upsets a few CEOs or lobbyists. In short, it means offering a clear alternative to “broken markets” and business-as-usual.

The winds of political change are blowing in a populist-left direction globally. It’s high time New Zealand’s left caught that wind. If Labour and the Greens cannot find the nerve to ride the new wave of public enthusiasm for economic justice, they risk being left behind by history.

In an age of crises and inequality, timidity is a recipe for oblivion. Boldness, on the other hand, just might revive the left’s fortunes.

Dr Bruce Edwards is a political commentator and analyst. He is director of the Integrity Institute, a campaigning and research organisation dedicated to strengthening New Zealand democratic institutions through transparency, accountability, and robust policy reform. Republished with the author’s permission.

]]> Bougainville legal dept looking towards sorcery violence policy https://asiapacificreport.nz/2025/06/13/bougainville-legal-dept-looking-towards-sorcery-violence-policy/ Fri, 13 Jun 2025 00:01:58 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=116005 RNZ Pacific

The Department of Justice and Legal Services in Bougainville is aiming to craft a government policy to deal with violence related to sorcery accusations.

The Post-Courier reports that a forum, which wrapped up on Wednesday, aimed to dissect the roots of sorcery/witchcraft beliefs and the severe violence stemming from accusations.

An initial forum was held in Arawa last month.

Central Bougainville’s Director of Justice and Legal Services, Dennis Kuiai, said the forums’ ultimate goal is crafting a government policy.

Further consultations are planned for South Bougainville next week and a regional forum in Arawa later this year.

“This policy will be deliberated and developed into law to address sorcery and [sorcery accusation-related violence] in Bougainville,” he said.

“We aim to provide an effective legal mechanism.”

Targeted 3 key areas
He said the future law’s structure was to target three key areas: the violence linked to accusations, sorcery practices themselves, and addressing the phenomenon of “glass man”.

A glassman or glassmeri has the power to accuse women and men of witchcraft and sorcery.

Papua New Guinea outlawed the practice in 2022.

The forum culminated in the compilation and signing of a resolution on its closing day, witnessed by officials.

Sorcery has long been an issue in PNG.

Those accused of sorcery are frequently beaten, tortured, and murdered, and anyone who manage to survive the attacks are banished from their communities.

Saved mother rejected
In April, a mother-of-four was was reportedly rejected by her own family after she was saved by a social justice advocacy group.

In August last year, an advocate told people in Aotearoa – where she was raising awareness – that Papua New Guinea desperately needed stronger laws to protect innocents and deliver justice for victims of sorcery related violence.

In October 2023, Papua New Guinea MPs were told that gender-based and sorcery violence was widespread and much higher than reported.

In November 2020, two men in the Bana district were hacked to death by members of a rival clan, who claimed the men used sorcery against them.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

]]> Standing for decency: The sermon the President didn’t want to hear https://asiapacificreport.nz/2025/01/23/standing-for-decency-the-sermon-the-president-didnt-want-to-hear/ Thu, 23 Jan 2025 04:00:05 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=109906 COMMENTARY: By Nick Rockel

People get ready
There’s a train a-coming
You don’t need no baggage
You just get on board
All you need is faith
To hear the diesels humming
Don’t need no ticket
You just thank the Lord

Songwriter: Curtis Mayfield

You might have seen Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde’s speech at the National Prayer Service in the United States following Trump’s elevation to the highest worldly position, or perhaps read about it in the news.

It’s well worth watching this short clip of her sermon if you haven’t, as the rest of this newsletter is about that and the reaction to it:


‘May I ask you to have mercy Mr President.’       Video: C-Span

I found the sermon courageous, heartfelt, and, above all, decent. It felt like there was finally an adult in the room again. Predictably, Trump and his vile little Vice-President responded like naughty little boys being reprimanded, reacting with anger at being told off in front of all their little mates.

That response will not have surprised the Bishop. As she prepared to deliver the end of her sermon, you could see her pause to collect her thoughts. She knew she would be criticised for what she was about to say, yet she had the courage to speak it regardless.

What followed was heartfelt and compelling, as the Bishop talked of the fears of LGBT people and immigrants.

Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde’s speaking at the National Prayer Service. Image: C-Span screenshot

She spoke of them as if they were human beings like the rest of us, saying they pay their taxes, are not criminals, and are good neighbours.

The president did not want to hear her message. His anger was building as his snivelling sidekick looked toward him to see how the big chief would respond.

The President didn't want to hear her message
The President didn’t want to hear her message. Image: C-Span screenshot

Vented on social media
So, how did the leader of the free world react? Did he take it on the chin, appreciating that he now needed to show leadership for all, or did he call the person asking him to show compassion — “nasty”?

That’s right, it was the second one. I’m afraid there’s no prize for that as you’re all excluded due to inside knowledge of that kind of behaviour from observing David Seymour. The ACT leader responds in pretty much the same way when someone more intelligent and human points out the flaws in his soul.

Donald then went on his own Truth social media platform, which he set up before he’d tamed the Tech Oligarchs, and vented, “The so-called bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a radical left hard-line Trump hater”.

Which isn’t very polite, but when you think about it, his response should be seen as a badge of honour. Especially for someone of the Christian faith because all those who follow the teachings of Christ ought to be “radical left hard-line Trump haters”, or else they’ve rather missed the point. Don’t you think?

Certainly, pastor and activist John Pavlovitz thought so, saying, “Christians who voted for him, you should be ashamed of yourselves. Of course, if you were capable of shame, you’d never have voted for him to begin with.”

Pastor and activist John Pavlovitz responds.
Pastor and activist John Pavlovitz responds.
“She brought her church into the world of politics in a very ungracious way. She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart,” continued the President, like a schoolyard bully.

I thought it was a bit rich for a man who has used the church and the bible in order to sell himself to false Christians who worship money, who has even claimed divine intervention from God, to then complain about the Bishop not staying in her lane.

Speaking out against bigotry
If religious leaders don’t speak out against bigotry, hatred, and threats to peaceful, decent human beings — then what’s the point?


I admired Budde’s bravery. Just quietly, the church hasn’t always had the best record of speaking out against those who’ve said the sort of things that Trump is saying.

If you’re unclear what I mean, I’m talking about Hitler, and it’s nice to see the church, or at least the Bishop, taking the other side this time around. Rather than offering compliance and collaboration, as they did then and as the political establishment in America is doing now.

Aside from all that, it feels like a weird, topsy-turvy world when the church is asking the government to be more compassionate towards the LGBT community.

El Douche hadn’t finished and said, “Apart from her inappropriate statements, the service was a very boring and uninspiring one. She is not very good at her job! She and her church owe the public an apology!”

It’s like he just says the opposite of what is happening, and people are so stupid or full of hate that they accept it, even though it’s obviously false.

So, the Bishop is derided as “nasty” when she is considerate and kind. She is called “Not Smart” when you only have to listen to her to know she is an intelligent, well-spoken person. She is called “Ungracious” when she is polite and respectful.

Willing wretches
As is the case with bullies, there are always wretches willing to support them and act similarly to win favour, even as many see them for what they are.

Mike Collins, a Republican House representative, tweeted, “The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list.”

Isn’t that disgusting? An elected politician saying that someone should be deported for daring to challenge the person at the top, even when it is so clearly needed.

Fox News host Sean Hannity said, “Instead of offering a benediction for our country, for our president, she goes on the far-left, woke tirade in front of Donald Trump and JD Vance, their families, their young children. She made the service about her very own deranged political beliefs with a disgraceful prayer full of fear-mongering and division.”

Perhaps most despicably, Robert Jeffress, the pastor of Dallas’s First Baptist Church, tweeted this sycophantic garbage:


Those cronies of Trump seem weak and dishonest to me compared to the words of Bishop Budde herself, who said the following after her sermon:

“I wanted to say there is room for mercy, there’s room for a broader compassion. We don’t need to portray with a broadcloth in the harshest of terms some of the most vulnerable people in our society, who are, in fact, our neighbours, our friends, our children, our friends, children, and so forth.”

Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde.
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde a courageous stand. Image: https://cathedral.org/about/leadership/the-rt-rev-mariann-edgar-budde/
Speaking up or silent?
Over the next four years, many Americans will have to choose between speaking up on issues they believe in or remaining silent and nodding in agreement.

The Republican party has made its pact with the Donald, and the Tech Bros have fallen over each other in their desire to kiss his ass; it will be a dark time for many regular people, no doubt, to stand up for what they believe in even as those with power and privilege fall in line behind the tyrant.

Decoding symbolism in Lord of the Flies
Decoding symbolism in Lord of the Flies. Image: https://wr1ter.com/decoding-symbolism-in-lord-of-the-flies
So, although I am not Christian, I am glad to see the Church stand up for those under attack, show courage in the face of the bully, and be the adult in the room when so many bow at the feet of the child with the conch shell.

In my view Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde is a hero, and she does herself great credit with this courageous, compassionate, Christian stand

First published by Nick’s Kōrero and republished with permission. For more of Nick Rockel’s articles or to subscribe to his blog, click here.

]]> Pacific media perspectives featured by authors in new communication book https://asiapacificreport.nz/2025/01/17/pacific-media-perspectives-featured-by-authors-in-new-communication-book/ Fri, 17 Jan 2025 02:53:25 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=109506 Pacific Media Watch

Four researchers and authors from the Asia-Pacific region have provided diverse perspectives on the media in a new global book on intercultural communication.

The Sage Handbook of Intercultural Communication published this week offers a global, interdisciplinary, and contextual approach to understanding the complexities of intercultural communication in our diverse and interconnected world.

It features University of Queensland academic Dr Mairead MacKinnon; founding director of the Pacific Media Centre professor David Robie; University of Ottawa’s Dr Marie M’Balla-Ndi Oelgemoeller; and University of the South Pacific journalism coordinator associate professor Shailendra Singh.

Featuring contributions from 56 leading and emerging scholars across multiple disciplines, including communication studies, psychology, applied linguistics, sociology, education, and business, the handbook covers research spanning geographical locations across Europe, Africa, Oceania, North America, South America, and the Asia Pacific.

It focuses on specific contexts such as the workplace, education, family, media, crisis, and intergroup interactions. Each chapter takes a contextual approach to examine theories and applications, providing insights into the dynamic interplay between culture, communication, and society.

One of the co-editors, University of Queensland’s associate professor Levi Obijiofor, says the book provides an overview of scholarship, outlining significant theories and research paradigms, and highlighting major debates and areas for further research in intercultural communication.

“Each chapter stands on its own and could be used as a teaching or research resource. Overall, the book fills a gap in the field by exploring new ideas, critical perspectives, and innovative methods,” he says.

Refugees to sustaining journalism
Dr MacKinnon writes about media’s impact on refugee perspectives of belonging in Australia; Dr Robie on how intercultural communication influences Pacific media models; Dr M’Balla-Ndi Oelgemoeller examines accounting for race in journalism education; and Dr Singh unpacks sustaining journalism in “uncertain times” in Pacific island states.

Dr Singh says that in research terms the book is important for contributing to global understandings about the nature of Pacific media.

The Sage Handbook of Intercultural Communication cover
The Sage Handbook of Intercultural Communication cover. Image: Sage Books

“The Pacific papers address a major gap in international scholarship on Pacific media. In terms of professional practice, the papers address structural problems in the regional media sector, thereby providing a clearer idea of long term solutions, as opposed to ad hoc measures and knee-jerk reactions, such as harsher legislation.”

Dr Robie, who is also editor of Asia Pacific Report and pioneered some new ways of examining Pacific media and intercultural inclusiveness in the Asia-Pacific region, says it is an important and comprehensive collection of essays and ought to be in every communication school library.

He refers to his “talanoa journalism” model, saying it “outlines a more culturally appropriate benchmark than monocultural media templates.

“Hopefully, this cross-cultural model would encourage more Pacific-based approaches in revisiting the role of the media to fit local contexts.”

Comprehensive exploration
The handbook brings together established theories, methodologies, and practices and provides a comprehensive exploration of intercultural communication in response to the challenges and opportunities presented by the global society.

From managing cultural diversity in the workplace to creating culturally inclusive learning environments in educational settings, from navigating intercultural relationships within families to understanding the role of media in shaping cultural perceptions, this handbook delves into diverse topics with depth and breadth.

It addresses contemporary issues such as hate speech, environmental communication, and communication strategies in times of crisis.

It also offers theoretical insights and practical recommendations for researchers, practitioners, policymakers, educators, and students.

The handbook is structured into seven parts, beginning with the theoretical and methodological development of the field before delving into specific contexts of intercultural communication.

Each part provides a rich exploration of key themes, supported by cutting-edge research and innovative approaches.

With its state-of-the-art content and forward-looking perspectives, this Sage Handbook of Intercultural Communication serves as an indispensable resource for understanding and navigating the complexities of intercultural communication in our increasingly interconnected world.

]]> Pope Francis – a message of peace and real change in Pacific political struggles https://asiapacificreport.nz/2024/09/15/pope-francis-a-message-of-peace-and-real-change-in-pacific-political-struggles/ Sun, 15 Sep 2024 00:01:24 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=105384 COMMENTARY: By Laurens Ikinia in Jakarta

Pope Francis has completed his historic first visit to Southeast Asian and Pacific nations.

The papal apostolic visit covered Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Singapore and Timor-Leste.

This visit is furst to the region after he was elected as the leader of the Catholic Church based in Rome and also as the Vatican Head of State.

Under Pope Francis’ leadership, many church traditions have been renewed. For example, he gives space to women to take some important leadership and managerial roles in Vatican.

Many believe that the movement of the smiling Pope in distributing roles to women and lay groups is a timely move. Besides, during his term as the head of the Vatican state, the Pope has changed the Vatican’s banking and financial system.

Now, it is more transparent and accountable.

Besides, the Holy Father bluntly acknowledges the darkness concealed by the church hierarchy for years and graciously apologises for the wrong committed by the church.

The Pope invites the clergy (shepherds) to live simply, mingling and uniting with the members of the congregation (sheep).

The former archbishop of Buenos Aires also encourages the church to open itself to accepting congregations who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT).

However, Papa Francis’ encouragement was flooded with protests from some members of the church. And it is still an ongoing spiritual battle that has not been fully delivered in Catholic Church.

Two encyclicals
Pope Francis, the successor of Apostle Peter, is a humble and modest man. Under his papacy, the highest authority of the Catholic Church has issued four apostolic works, two in the form of encyclicals, namely Lumen Fidei (Light of Faith) and Laudato si’ (Praise Be to You) and two others in the form of apostolic exhortations, namely Evangelii Gaudium (Joy of the Gospel) and Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love).

Of the four masterpieces of the Pope, the encyclical Laudato si’ seems to gain most attention globally.

The encyclical Laudato si’ is an invitation from the Holy Father to human beings to be responsible for the existence of the universe. He begs us human beings not to exploit and torture Mother Nature.

We should respect nature because it provides plants and cares for us like a mother does for her children. Therefore, caring for the environment or the universe is a calling that needs to be responded to genuinely.

This apostolic call is timely because the world is experiencing various threats of natural devastation that leads to natural disasters.

The irresponsible and greedy behaviour of human beings has destroyed the beauty and diversity of the flora and fauna. Other parts of the world have experienced and are experiencing adverse impacts.

This is also taking place in the Pacific region.

Sinking cities
The World Economy Forum (2019) reports that it is estimated there will be eleven cities in the world that will “sink” by 2100. The cities listed include Jakarta (Indonesia), Lagos (Nigeria), Houston (Texas-US), Dhaka (Bangladesh), Virginia Beach (Virginia-US), Bangkok (Thailand), New Orleans (Louisiana-US), Rotterdam (Netherlands), Alexandra (Egypt), and Miami (Florida-US).

During the visit of the 266th Pope, he addressed the importance of securing and protecting our environment and climate crisis.

During the historic interfaith dialogue held at the Jakarta’s Istiqlal Mosque on September 5, the 87-year-old Pope said Indonesia was blessed with rainforest and rich in natural resources.

He indirectly referred to the Land of Papua — internationally known as West Papua. The message was not only addressed to the government of Indonesia, but also to Papua New Guinea.

The apostolic visit amazed people in Indonesia which is predominantly a Muslim nation. The humbleness and friendliness of Papa Francis touched the hearts of many, not only Christians, but also people with other religious backgrounds.

Witnessing the presence of the Pope in Jakarta firsthand, we could certainly testify that his presence has brought tremendous joy and will be remembered forever. Those who experienced joy were not only because of the direct encounter.

Some were inspired when watching the broadcast on the mainstream or social media.

The Pope humbly made himself available to be greeted by his people and blessed those who approached him. Those who received the greeting from the Holy Father also came from different age groups — starting from babies in the womb, toddlers and teenagers, young people, adults, the elderly and brothers and sisters with disabilities.

Pope brings inner comfort
An unforgettable experience of faith that the people of the four nations did not expect, but experienced, was that the presence of the Pope Francis brought inner comfort. It was tremendously significant given the social conditions of Indonesia, PNG and Timor-Leste are troubled politically and psychologically.

State policies that do not lift the people out of poverty, practices of injustice that are still rampant, corruption that seems endemic and systemic, the seizure of indigenous people’s customary land by giant companies with government permission, and an economic system that brings profits to a handful of people are some of the factors that have caused disturbed the inner peace of the people.

In Indonesia, soon after the inauguration on October 20 of the elected President and Vice-President, Prabowo Subianto and Gibran Rakabuming Raka, the people of Indonesia will welcome the election of governors and deputy governors, regents and deputy regents, mayors and deputy mayors.

This will include the six provinces in the Land of Papua. The simultaneous regional elections will be held on November 27.

The public will monitor the process of the regional election. Reflecting on the presidential election which allegedly involved the current President’s “interference”, in the collective memory of democracy lovers there is a possibility of interference from the government that will lead the nation.

Could that happen? Only time will tell. The task of all elements of society is to jointly maintain the values of honest, honest and open democracy.

Pope Francis in his book, Let Us Dream, the Path to the Future (2020) wrote:

“We need a politics that can integrate and dialogue with the poor, the excluded, and the vulnerable that gives people a say in the decisions that impact their lives.”

Hope for people’s struggles
This message of Pope Francis has a deep meaning in the current context. What is common everywhere, politicians only make sweet promises or give fake hope to voters so that they are elected.

After being elected, the winning or elected candidate tends to be far from the people.

Therefore, a fragment of the Holy Father’s invitation in the book needs to be a shared concern. The written and implied meaning of the fragment above is not far from the democratic values adopted by Indonesia and other Pacific nations.

Pacific Islanders highly value the views of each person. But lately the noble values that were well-cultivated and inherited by the ancestors are increasingly diminishing.

Hopefully, the governments will deliver on the real needs and struggles of the people.

“Our greatest power is not in the respect that others have for us, but the service we can give others,” wrote Pope Francis.

Laurens Ikinia is a lecturer and researcher at the Institute of Pacific Studies, Indonesian Christian University, Jakarta, and is a member of the Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN).

]]> How former Greens MP Keith Locke often became a voice for the Pacific https://asiapacificreport.nz/2024/06/27/how-former-greens-mp-keith-locke-often-became-a-voice-for-the-pacific/ Thu, 27 Jun 2024 05:09:08 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=103222 OBITUARY: By Philip Cass of Kaniva Tonga

A New Zealand politician and human rights activist with a strong connection to Tonga’s Democracy movement and other Pacific activism has been farewelled after dying last week aged 80.

Keith Locke served as a former Green MP from 1999 to 2011.

While in Parliament, he was a notable critic of New Zealand’s involvement in the war in Afghanistan and the Terrorism Suppression Act 2002, and advocated for refugee rights.

He was appointed a Member of the NZ Order of Merit for services to human rights advocacy in 2021, received NZ Amnesty International’s Human Rights Defender award in 2012, and the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand’s Harmony Award in 2013.

Locke was often a voice for the Pacific in the New Zealand Parliament.

In 2000, he spoke out on the plight of overstayers who were facing deportation under the National Party government.

As the Green Party’s then immigration spokesperson, he supported calls for a review of the overstayer legislation.

Links to Pohiva
“We are a Polynesian nation, and we increasingly celebrate the Samoan and Tongan part of our national identity,” Locke said at the time.

“How can we claim as our own the Jonah Lomus and Beatrice Faumuinas while we are prepared to toss their relations out of the country at a moment’s notice?”

Locke had links to Tonga through his relationship with Democracy campaigner and later Prime Minister ‘Akilisi Pohiva, who died in 2019.

Tongan Prime Minister 'Akilisi Pōhiva
The late Tongan Prime Minister ‘Akilisi Pōhiva … defended by Keith Locke in 1996 when Pohiva and two colleagues had been jailed for comments in their pro-democracy newspaper Kele’a. Image: Kalino Lātū/Kaniva News

Locke defended Pohiva in 1996 when he was a spokesperson for the Alliance Party. He said he was horrified that Pohiva and two colleagues had been jailed for comments in their pro-democracy newspaper Kele’a.

He criticised the New Zealand government for keeping silent about what he described as a “gross abuse of human rights.”

In 2004, Locke called on the New Zealand government to speak out about what he called the suppression of the press in Tonga.

Locke, who was then the Greens foreign affairs spokesman, said several publications had been denied licences, including an offshoot of the New Zealand-produced Taimi ‘o Tonga newspaper.


Tribute by Asia Pacific Report editor David Robie.

‘Speak out as Pacific neighbour’
“We owe it to the Tongan people to support them in their hour of need.  We should speak out as a Pacific neighbour,” he said.

In 2007, ‘Akilisi was again charged with sedition, along with four other pro-democracy MPs, for allegedly being responsible for the rioting that took place following a mass pro-democracy march in Nuku’alofa.

Flags of the countries of some of the many causes Keith Locke supported
Flags of the countries of some of the many causes Keith Locke supported at the memorial service in Mount Eden this week. Image: David Robie/APR

“As the Greens’ foreign affairs spokesperson I went up to Tonga to support ‘Akilisi and his colleagues fight these trumped-up charges. I was shocked to find that the New Zealand government was going along with these sedition charges against five sitting MPs,” Locke said in an interview.

“I was in Tonga not long before the 2010 elections with a cross-party group of New Zealand MPs. We were helping Tongan candidates understand the intricacies of a parliamentary system.

“At the time I remember ‘Akilisi being worried that the block of nine ‘noble’ MPs could frustrate the desires of what were to be 17 directly-elected MPs. And so it turned out.

“Despite winning 12 of the popularly-elected 17 seats in 2010, the pro-democracy MPs were outvoted 14 to 12 when the votes of the nine nobles MPs were put into the equation.

“However, in the two subsequent elections (2014 and 2017) the Democrats predominated and ‘Akilisi took over as Prime Minister. I am not qualified to judge his record on domestic issues, except to say it couldn’t have been an easy job because of the fractious nature of Tongan politics.

“And ‘Akilisi has been in poor health.

Political tee-shirts and mementoes from Keith Locke's campaign issues
Political tee-shirts and mementoes from Keith Locke’s campaign issues at the memorial service in Mount Eden this week. Image: Del Abcede/APR

‘Admirable stand’
“As Prime Minister he took an admirable stand on some important international issues, such as climate change. At the Pacific Island Forum he criticised those countries which stayed silent on the plight of the West Papuans.”

Locke said that Tonga may not yet be fully democratic, but that great progress had been made under Pohiva’s “humble and self-sacrificing leadership.”

Keith Locke was also an outspoken advocate for democracy and independence causes in Fiji, Kanaky New Caledonia, Palestine, Philippines, Tahiti, Tibet, Timor-Leste and West Papua and in many other countries.

His remembrance service was held with whānau and supporters at a packed Mount Eden War memorial Hall on Tuesday.

Dr Philip Cass is an editorial adviser for Kaniva Tonga. Republished as a collaboration between KT and Asia Pacific Report.

]]> Warning signs have been flashing, PNG police housing needs ignored https://asiapacificreport.nz/2024/03/13/warning-signs-have-been-flashing-png-police-housing-needs-ignored/ Tue, 12 Mar 2024 12:40:41 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=98172 By Scott Waide in Lae, Papua New Guinea

Ten days into 2024, Port Moresby descended into chaos as opportunists looted and burned shops in Waigani, Gerehu and other suburbs.

That morning, police, military and correctional service personnel gathered at the Unagi Oval in protest over deductions made to their pays that fortnight. Unsatisfied with the explanations, they withdrew their services and converged on Parliament to seek answers.

It took just a few hours for the delicate balance between order and chaos to be tipped to one side.

In the absence of police, people took to the streets. They looted shops nearest to them and forced the closure of the entire city. Several people died during the looting.

The politicians — the lawmakers — were left powerless as the enforcers of the law became spectators allowing the mayhem to worsen.

While many saw the so-called Black Wednesday, 10 January, 202, as a one off incident caused by “disgruntled” members of the services, the warning signs had been flashing for many years and had been largely ignored.

Two weeks back, I asked a constable attached with one of Lae’s Sector Response Units (SRU) about his take home pay. It is an uncomfortable discussion to have.

Living conditions
But it is necessary to understand the pay and living conditions of the men and women who maintain that delicate balance in Papua New Guinea.

He said his take home pay was about K900 (NZ$385). When the so-called “glitch” happened in the Finance Department, many RPNGC members like him had up to one third of their pay deducted. That’s a sizable chunk for a small family.

Policemen and women won’t talk about it publicly.

They also won’t talk about the difficulties and frustrations they face at home when there’s a pay deduction like the one in January.

Black Wednesday showed the culmination of frustrations over years of unpaid allowances, poor living conditions and successive governments that have ignored basic needs in favour of grand announcements and flashy deployments that prop up political egos.

Why am I raising this? What does Black Wednesday have to do with anything?

That incident showed just how important the lowest paid frontline cops are in the socioeconomic ecosystem that we live in. The politicians, make the laws, they “maintain law and order” and we’re supposed to obey.

Oath of service
Police, military and correctional service personnel, entrust their welfare to the state when they sign an oath of service. This means the government is obliged to care for them, while they SERVE the state and the people of Papua New Guinea.

But for decades, successive governments seem to have forgotten their obligations.

Out of sight. Out of mind.

Politicians have opted for short term adhoc welfare “pills” like paying for deployment allowances while ignoring the long term needs like housing and general living conditions.

Let me bring your attention now to 17 police families living in dormitories at at a condemned training center owned by the Department of Agriculture and Livestock at 3-mile in Lae.

The policemen who live with their families didn’t want to speak on record. But their wives spoke for their families. Many have little option but to remain there. Rent is expensive. Living in settlements puts their policemen husbands at risk.

Here’s the question
There’s no running water or electricity.

Here’s the question: How does the government expect a constable to function when his or her family is unsafe and unwell?

The Acting ACP for the Northern Division, Chris Kunyanban has seen it play out time and time again. He said, as a commander, it is difficult to get a cop who is struggling to fix his rundown police housing to work 12 hour shifts while there’s a leaking roof and a sick child.

It’s that simple.

The government says it is committed to increasing police numbers. Recruitments are ongoing. But there is still a dire shortage of housing for police.

Republished from Lekmak with permission.

]]> Fiji children ‘abandoned, forgotten’ by overseas workers, says counsellor https://asiapacificreport.nz/2023/06/20/fiji-children-abandoned-forgotten-by-overseas-workers-says-counsellor/ Tue, 20 Jun 2023 02:20:53 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=90006 By Elena Vucukula in Suva

Children are abandoned and forgotten when a large number of Fijians leave the country for work and start new relationships abroad.

Consultant Marica Tabualevu of the Fiji-Australian Humanitarian Partnership has called for measures that would hold people responsible or accountable for forgotten children.

She said adults who engaged in such behaviour forgot they had children “left behind with no income or very little parental support” just because they did not want their partner anymore.

Tabualevu told a public consultation in Suva last Friday discussing a draft of the Child Care and Protection Bill and Child Justice Bill 2023 that too many children were being “abandoned”.

Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre’s senior counsellor advocate and community educator Ilisapeci Veibuli also called on the Fiji government to ensure there was sufficient budget to support the draft law as implementation and enforcement were important.

In a separate event, the NGO Empower Pacific said that last year more than 1040 children were counselled with the bulk of them suffering from depression.

Elena Vucukula is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.

]]> Obituary: Tui Rererangi Walsh O’Sullivan, the ‘flying bird in the sky’ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2023/06/02/obituary-tui-rererangi-walsh-osullivan-the-flying-bird-in-the-sky/ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2023/06/02/obituary-tui-rererangi-walsh-osullivan-the-flying-bird-in-the-sky/#comments Fri, 02 Jun 2023 10:22:20 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=89204 OBITUARY: By Dominic O’Sullivan

Tui Rererangi Walsh O’Sullivan, 4 July 1940 — 20 May 2023

Kia ora koutau katoa. Kia ora mo o koutou haerenga i te ahiahi nei. Kia ora mo o koutou aroha, o koutou karakia mo Tui i te wa o tona harenga ki te rangi.

I whanau mai a Tui, kei Kaitaia, hei uri o Te Rarawa, i te tau kotahi mano, iwa rau, wha tekau.

Tui was born in Kaitaia in 1940 — exactly 100 years after her great-great grandfather, Te Riipi, signed the Treaty of Waitangi. She was descended, too, from a Scotsman, John Borrowdale who named his boat Half Caste — after his children. Such was the mystery of race, life and family in 19th century Northland.

Tui was the last born child of Jack and Maata Walsh, and sister of John, Pat, Rose and Michael. Maata was Te Rarawa, from Pukepoto. Tui lies alongside her at Rangihoukaha Urupa in Pukepoto. She was named Tui Rererangi, the flying bird in the sky, in honour of her uncle Billy Busby — a World War II fighter pilot.

Maata died when Tui was two years old. She and Rose and their brothers were raised by their father, Jack Walsh, his mother Maud and his sister Lil. Maud was born in Townsville. Her father was a lacemaker from Nottingham who emigrated, with his wife, firstly to Australia and then to the far North of New Zealand.

Jack was born in Houhora and died when Tui was 23. Jack’s father emigrated from Limerick.
Early in the next century, the writer Frank McCourt described Limerick, just as it had been in Timothy Walsh’s time, “It was, of course, a miserable childhood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood is the miserable Irish childhood, and worse yet is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood.”

It was a better world these people sought, in and with, Te Rarawa.

Tui’s story — almost 83 years — spans a time of rapid social, political and technological development in New Zealand and the world. Her contribution was transformative for the many, many, people she encountered in her professional, social and family lives.

Tui’s schooling began at Ahipara Native School. Transcending the government’s official purpose of the Native School, of “lead[ing] the lad to be a good farmer and the girl to be a good farmer’s wife” — Tui left primary school with a Ngarimu VC and 28th Maori Battalion Scholarship to St Mary’s College in Ponsonby.

Some of her friends from St Mary’s are here today, and her granddaughter, named in her honour, started at the school this year.

Disrupting social orthodoxy was Tui’s life. On leaving school, she enrolled at the University of Auckland, completing a degree in English and anthropology part-time over the next 20 years. During these years she trained as a primary school teacher, working in Auckland, Wellington, Cambridge, Athens and London.

In the past week, we took a phone call from somebody Tui had taught at Kelburn Normal School in the 1960s. Such was Tui’s impact.

I was born in Hamilton in 1970. Deirdre in Cambridge in 1973. We moved to Northcote Point in 1975 and, in 1977, Tui became the first woman and the first Māori appointed to a permanent position at what was then the Auckland Technical Institute. I remember her telling me she was going for a job interview and coming into this Church to pray that she would be successful. Deirdre and I did our primary schooling here at St Mary’s.

Being a working single parent in the 1970s and 80s was hard work. It didn’t reflect social norms, but the Auckland University of Technology, as it’s become, provided Tui, Deirdre and me with security and a home – a home that has been Tui’s since 1978.

At AUT, she developed the first Women on Campus group. She helped establish the newspaper Password, a publication introducing new English speakers to New Zealand society and culture.

She taught courses on the Treaty of Waitangi when the treaty was a subversive idea. She contributed to the change in social and political thought that has brought the treaty — that her tupuna signed — to greater public influence. The justice it promises was a major theme in Tui’s working life.

Tui was interested in justice more broadly, inspired by her Catholic faith, love of people and profound compassion. These values stood out in the memories of Tui that people shared during her tangihanga earlier in the week at Te Uri o Hina Marae.

On Twitter, like them all, a social media that Tui never mastered, a former student, some 40 years later, recalled “the sage advice” given to a “young fella from Kawerau”. As Tui remembered, for a Māori kid from the country, moving to town can be moving to a different world.

In a media interview on her retirement, she said: “Coming from a town where you didn’t know names, but everyone was Aunty or Uncle, Auckland was by far a change of scenery”.
In Auckland, Tui knew everybody. Always the last to leave a social function, and always the first to help people in need.

Tui helped establish the university’s marae in 1997. She would delight in sharing the marae with students and colleagues. Just as she delighted in her family — especially her grandchildren, Lucy, Xavier, Joey, Tui and Delphi.

She remembered Sarah Therese. Her grandchildren tell of their special times with her, and her deep interest in their lives. Last year, Deirdre and Malcolm and their children moved from Wellington to be close by. Joey and I came from Canberra for the year.

We talked and helped as we could. My job was to buy the smokes. I remember saying one day, “I’m going to the supermarket, what would you like for dinner” — “a packet of cigarettes and a bottle of wine”. That was Tui’s diet and she loved it. And it was only in the last few months that she stopped going out.

At the wake for her brother John’s wife, Maka, in November, she was still going at three in the morning. I worried that three bottles of wine mightn’t have been the best idea at that stage in life, but she was well enough to do it, and loved the company of her family as we loved being with her.

In December, she took Joey and Tui to mark their birthdays at the revolving restaurant at the Sky Tower, where she also joined in the celebration of Lucy’s 18th birthday a couple of months ago. Delphi liked to take her out for a pancake. She loved Xavier’s fishing and rugby stories.

Over the last year, she wasn’t well enough to watch her grandchildren’s sport as she would have liked, take them to the beach as she used to love, or attend important events in our lives. But she did what she could right until the end.

My last conversation with her, the day before she died, was slow and tired but cogent and interesting. We discussed the politics of the day, as we often did. She asked after Joey and Lucy, and after Cara — always concerned that they were doing well. She didn’t speak for long, which was out of character, but gave no reason to think that this would be the last time we spoke.

Her copy of my book, Indigeneity, Culture and the UN Sustainable Development Goals,  published last month, is still in the post. She didn’t know that it was dedicated to her and that I had explained, in the acknowledgements, that the reasons needed more words than the book itself.

That was supposed to have been for her to read, and for her to learn, that the dedication was also from her grandchildren. She was the immediate and unanimous choice when I asked them, “to whom should I dedicate this book”.

No reira, ka nui te mihi ki tena ki tena o koutou. Kia ora mo o koutou manaaki me te aroha.

Kia ora huihui tatau katoa!

Dr Dominic O’Sullivan, Tui’s son and professor of political science at Charles Sturt University, delivered this eulogy at her memorial mass at St Mary’s Catholic Church, Northcote, on 27 May 2023. It is republished here with the whanau’s permission. Tui O’Sullivan was also a foundation Advisory Board member of the Pacific Media Centre in 2007 and was a feisty advocate for the centre and its research publication, Pacific Journalism Review, until she retired in 2018.

]]> https://asiapacificreport.nz/2023/06/02/obituary-tui-rererangi-walsh-osullivan-the-flying-bird-in-the-sky/feed/ 1 Sepuloni’s ‘historic’ appointment symbolic for NZ, say Pacific leaders https://asiapacificreport.nz/2023/01/23/sepulonis-historic-appointment-symbolic-for-nz-say-pacific-leaders/ Mon, 23 Jan 2023 01:00:08 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=83349 RNZ News

Leaders in Aotearoa New Zealand’s Pacific community believe the appointment of the country’s first deputy prime minister of Pacific descent will bring positive change.

Incoming Prime Minister Chris Hipkins — who is taking over the reins from Jacinda Ardern just nine months away from the general elections — chose Carmel Sepuloni as his deputy yesterday.

She also made history 15 years ago when she became New Zealand’s first Tongan MP.

Reverend Setaita Veikune of the Methodist Church of NZ told RNZ Morning Report the Kelston MP’s promotion would serve as an inspiration for the younger generation, particularly girls.

“This is a visible example of what we can achieve and proof that for our people, the sky really is the limit,” she said.

“Carmel being a Tongan, Samoan woman as deputy prime minister, is a profound contribution in my opinion to eliminating negative stereotypes and reducing unconscious bias against us.

“This alone does more for our communities than many realise, such as reducing advancement barriers, which are biased against us in different spaces.” 

Historic moment
Pacific community leader Sir Collin Tukuitonga told Morning Report this was a historic moment not just for their community, but the whole country.

“I think it’s a statement of ourselves as a nation that perhaps we’re maturing and being serious about inclusivity.”

Sepuloni’s experiences and networks in Pasifika and Māoridom communities would bring benefits as she supported Hipkins’ leadership, he said.

Veikune hoped Sepuloni — who currently holds portfolios for social development, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC), and arts, culture and heritage — would work to bring the Pasifika community forward with her.

“I find her very strong in her quiet and humble way . . .  She brings strength, courage, and determination, to do what is required, and I believe her humility is something that will take us forward greatly.”

In an interview with E-Tangata in 2017, Sepuloni said she had thought of entering politics from a young age, with the ambition of helping create a fairer society.

“Interestingly, growing up — and friends still remind me of this — I used to say that this is what I would do. That I would be a politician. And they found it so funny at the time,” she said.

‘Unfairness around us’
“We can see the unfairness unfolding around us, whether it be health statistics or educational outcomes. Pay inequality. All of those things that we see in our own lives, our families’ lives, and our communities. So, I think it’s really difficult not to feel political in some way.”

As Minister of Social Development for the past five years, Sepuloni has been steadily reforming the system via measures including raising benefit levels, adopting a less punitive approach to sanctions and overseeing a review of the Working for Families welfare scheme.

Writing in the Herald at the time of ram raids last August, Sepuloni reflected on her time as an at-risk youth educator with tertiary students.

“I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t, and punitive approaches to young people – or people in general, really – already experiencing complex challenges don’t. I liken it to pushing someone over who is wanting and trying to get up, while yelling at them to get up.”

But in 2021, a report from Child Poverty Action Group found almost three years on from the Welfare Expert Advisory Group’s 42 recommendations for overhauling the system, none had been fully implemented.

Collin Tukuitonga
Sir Collin Tukuitonga . . . “Perhaps she will have a bit more sway and influence in getting . . . things done.” Image: University of Auckland/RNZ Pacific

Sir Collin said it would be tough to lay all of the blame on Sepuloni alone — it was more complex than that.

Building consensus
“She would have to build consensus from among a number of parties to get those implemented, she has moved on some of the recommendations but I think it’s a bit rough to just put it on her.

“There will be expectations and some would say she’s now in a deputy prime minister role that perhaps she will have a bit more sway and influence in getting these things done.

“There’s no question there are serious social issues in our communities that need to be addressed, I expect that Carmel would need to lead that process of building consensus and acting on those priorities.”

While Sir Collin acknowledged he was among those who criticised the government in the early days of the covid-19 pandemic over the “sluggish and slow” response to the outbreak in Pacific communities specifically, he said they got it right in the end.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

]]> Fate of NZ research centre highlights university ‘blindness’, media freedom https://asiapacificreport.nz/2022/12/08/fate-of-nz-research-centre-highlights-university-blindness-media-freedom/ Wed, 07 Dec 2022 18:23:45 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=81099 SPECIAL REPORT: By Dr Lee Duffield

The launch of a New Zealand project to produce more Pacific news and provide a “voice for the voiceless” on the islands has highlighted the neglect of that field by Australia and New Zealand — and also problems in universities.

The new development is the non-government, non-university Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN), a research base and publishing platform.

Its opening followed the cleaning-out of a centre within the Auckland University of Technology (AUT) — in an exercise exemplifying the kind of micro infighting that goes on hardly glimpsed from outside the academic world.

Cleaning out media centre
The story features an unannounced move by university staff to vacate the offices of an active journalism teaching and publishing base, the Pacific Media Centre, in early February 2021.

Seven weeks after the retirement of that centre’s foundation director, Professor David Robie, staff of AUT’s School of Communication Studies turned up and stripped it, taking out the archives and Pacific taonga — valued artifacts from across the region.

Staff still based there did not know of this move until later.

The centre had been in operation for 13 years — it was popular with Pasifika students, especially postgrads who would go on reporting ventures for practice-led research around the Pacific; it was a base for online news, for example prolific outlets including a regular Pacific Media Watch; it had international standing especially through the well-rated (“SCOPUS-listed”) academic journal Pacific Journalism Review; and it was a cultural hub, where guests might receive a sung greeting from the staff, Pacific-style, or see fascinating art works and craft.

Its uptake across the “Blue Continent” showed up gaps in mainstream media services and in Australia’s case famously the backlog in promoting economic and cultural ties.


The PMC Project — a short documentary about the centre by Alistar Kata in 2016. Video: Pacific Media Centre

Human rights and media freedom
The centre was founded in 2007, in a troubled era following a rogue military coup d’etat in Fiji, civil disturbances in Papua New Guinea, violent attacks on journalists in several parts, and endemic gender violence listed as a priority problem for the Pacific Islands Forum.

Through its publishing and conference activity it would take a stand on human rights and media freedom issues, social justice, economic and media domination from outside.

The actual physical evacuation was on the orders of the communications head of school at AUT, Dr Rosser Johnson, a recently appointed associate professor with a history of management service in several acting roles since 2005. He told the Australia Asia Pacific Media Initiative (AAPMI) in response to its formal complaint to AUT that it was “gutting” the centre that the university planned to keep a centre called the PMC and co-locate its offices with other centres — but that never happened.

His intervention caused predictable critical responses, as with this comment by a former New Zealand Herald editor-in-chief, Dr Gavin Ellis, on dealing with corporatised universities, in “neo-liberal” times:

“For many years I thought universities were the ideal place to establish centres of investigative journalism excellence … My views have been shaken to the core by the Auckland University of Technology gutting the Pacific Media Centre.”

Conflicts over truth-telling
The “PMC affair” has stirred conflicts that should worry observers who place value on truth-finding and truth-telling in university research, preparation for the professions, and academic freedom.

The Independent Australia report on the fate of the PMC
The Independent Australia report on the fate of the PMC last weekend. Image: Asia Pacific Report

The centre along with its counterpart at the University of Technology Sydney, called the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism (ACIJ), worked in the area of journalism as research, applying journalistic skills and methods, especially exercises in investigative journalism.

The ACIJ produced among many investigations, work on the reporting of climate policy and climate science, and the News of the World phone hacking scandal. It also was peremptorily shut-down, three years ahead of the PMC.

Both centres were placed in the journalism academic discipline, a “professional” and “teaching” discipline that traditionally draws in high achieving students interested in its practice-led approach.

All of which is decried by line academics in disciplines without professional linkages but a professional interest in the hierarchical arrangements and power relations within the confined space of their universities.

There the interest is in theoretical teaching and research outputs, often-enough called “Marxist”, “postmodern”, “communications” or “cultural studies”, angled at a de-legitimisation of “Western-liberal” mass media. Not that journalism education itself shies away from media criticism, as Dr Robie told Independent Australia:

“The Pacific Media Centre frequently challenged ‘ethnocentric journalistic practice’ and placed Māori, Pacific and indigenous and cultural diversity at the heart of the centre’s experiential knowledge and critical-thinking news narratives.”

Yet it can be seen how conflict may arise, especially where smaller journalism departments come under “takeover” pressure. It is a handy option for academic managers to subsume “journalism”, and get the staff positions that can be filled with non-journalists; the contribution the journalists may make to research earnings (through the Australian Excellence in Research process, or NZ Performance Based Research Fund), and especially government funding for student places.

There, better students likely to excel and complete their programmes can be induced to do more generalised courses with a specialist “journalism” label.

Any such conflict in the AUT case cannot be measured but must be at least lurking in the background.

What is ‘ideology’?
Another problem exists, where a centre like the former PMC will commit to defined values, even officially sanctioned ones like inclusivity and rejection of discrimination.

Undertakings like the PMC’s “Bearing Witness” projects, where students would deploy classic journalism techniques for investigations on a nuclear-free Pacific or climate change, can irritate conservative interests.

The derogatory expression for any connection with social movements is “ideological”. This time it is an unknown, but a School moving against an “ideological” unit, might get at least tacit support from higher-ups supposing that eviscerating it might help the institution’s “good name”.

What implications for future journalism, freedom and quality of media? Hostility towards specific professional education for journalism exists fairly widely. The rough-housing of the journalism centre at AUT is indicative, where efforts by the out-going director to organise succession after his retirement, five years in advance, received no response.

The position statement was changed to take away a requirement for actual Pacific media identity or expertise, and the job left vacant, in part a covid effect. The centre performed well on its key performance indicators, if small in size, which brought in limited research grants but good returns for academic publications:

“On 18 December 2020 – the day I officially retired – I wrote to the [then] Vice-Chancellor, Derek McCormack … expressing my concern about the future of the centre, saying the situation was “unconscionable and inexplicable”. I never received an acknowledgement or reply.”

Pacific futures
Journalism education has persisted through an adverse climate, where the number of journalists in mainstream media has declined, in New Zealand almost halved to 2061, (2006 – 2018). AUT celebrated 50 years of journalism teaching this week.

Also, AUT is currently in turmoil over the future of Māori and Pacific academics and the status of the university with an unpopular move to retrench 170 academic staff.

The latest Pacific Journalism Review July 2022
The latest Pacific Journalism Review . . . published for 28 years. Image: PJR

However new media are expanding, new demands exist for media competency across the exploding world “mediascape”, schools cultivating conscionable practices are providing an antidote to floods of bigotry and lies in social media.

The new NGO in Auckland, the APMN, has found a good base of support across the Pacific communities, limbering up for a future free of interference, outside of the former university base.

It will be bidding for a share of NZ government grants intended to assist public journalism, ethnic broadcasting and outreach to the region. While several products of the former centre have closed, the successful 28-year-old research journal Pacific Journalism Review has continued, producing two editions under its new management.

The operation is also keeping its production-side media strengths, such as with the online title Asia Pacific Report.

Independent Australia media editor Dr Lee Duffield is a former ABC correspondent and academic. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of Pacific Journalism Review. This article is republished with the author’s permission.

]]> New book has focus on Pacific activists against militarism, for climate justice https://asiapacificreport.nz/2022/08/12/new-book-has-focus-on-pacific-activists-against-militarism-for-climate-justice/ Thu, 11 Aug 2022 13:57:32 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=77725 Pacific Media Watch newsdesk

A new Aotearoa New Zealand book focusing on activists and their causes against militarism and for social struggles and climate justice across the Asia-Pacific is being launched in Wellington today.

Peace Action: Struggles for a decolonised and demilitarised Oceania and East Asia, edited by Wellington-based activist Valerie Morse, is the first book published by Left of the Equator Press.

“This book highlights the role of militarism as an ongoing colonial force,” says Morse.

“It is a collection of stories about activists, their organising and their causes, and the interconnections between social struggles separated by the vast expanse of Te Moana-Nui-A-Kiwa.”

It includes chapters on the Doctrine of Discovery (Tina Ngata), on protecting Ihumātao (Pania Newton, Qiane Matata-Sipu mā), on anti-militarist organising in South Korea, on campaigning against US military training in Hawai’i and Japan, on French colonialism in Mā’ohi Nui and Kanaky, about Korean peace movements in Aotearoa and Australia, about Indonesia’s occupation of West Papua, on feminist resistance to war in so-called Australia, on NZ’s history of Chinese-Māori solidarity, and on peace gardening at Parihaka.

“The increasing military build up across the Pacific has come into sharp focus this year,” said Morse.

“Having any influence over issues of war and international affairs can feel impossible, but grassroots movements for decolonisation and peace are the heart of countering this spiralling militarism and addressing the region’s most pressing issues, including climate justice.”

She says she was inspired to do the book from learning about the kinds of organising across the Pacific rim.

“I wanted to share that learning in order to inspire and inform others.”

Peace Action tall
Peace Action … the new book. Image: Left of the Equator

The book launch was an “awesome way to celebrate solidarity and connection with each other” and to build a collective knowledge for change.

It is being hosted at Trades Hall on Vivian Street in Wellington at 5.30pm today.

Trade Unions based at the hall were deeply involved in the Nuclear-Free and Independent Pacific (NFIP) movement.

More information: leftequator@gmail.com

]]> Philippine police arrest ex-VP social justice candidate Bello for cyber libel https://asiapacificreport.nz/2022/08/09/philippine-police-arrest-ex-vp-social-justice-candidate-bello-for-cyber-libel/ Mon, 08 Aug 2022 20:43:10 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=77558 By Jairo Bolledo of Rappler in Manila

Former Philippines vice-presidential candidate and Laban ng Masa chairperson Walden Bello has been arrested for two counts of alleged cyber libel by the police.

Bello, 76, is a globally renowned environmental and social justice activist and academic.

Bello’s arrest yesterday was confirmed by his executive secretary and Laban ng Masa spokesperson Leomar Doctolero.

The former VP candidate was brought to the Quezon City Police District (QCPD) Station 8 in Project 4, Quezon City.

“Walden has just been arrested for cyber libel by officers of the QCPD. He is currently being taken to QC Police Station 8, P. Tuazon,” Doctolero said.

It was Davao City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 10 Judge Retrina Espe Fuentes who issued the arrest warrant yesterday. Bello’s counsels said they will move for the suspension of proceedings at RTC 10 after Bello posts bail.

Two counts of cyber libel
Bello faces two counts of cyber libel for which bail has been set at P48,000 (NZ$4000) each.

Police Lieutenant-Colonel Gilmore Wasin confirmed Bello’s arrest to Rappler. He added Bello would be transferred to Camp Karingal in Quezon City, QCPD’s headquarters.

Doctolero said they had been anticipating the arrest because Bello had already been indicted for the cases last month.

“We have been anticipating the arrest warrant because of the indictment of the Davao Prosecutor. It’s a bailable offence and counsel is on the way to assist him.”

Walden Bello in handcuffs
Walden Bello in detention displays his handcuffs in a post on his Facebook account. Image: Walden Bello

Bello’s camp filed a motion for reconsideration before the Davao prosecutor’s office but it was denied, Doctolero explained.

“The resolution for his indictment was released last June 9. We filed for a motion for reconsideration with the Prosecutors’ Office which was subsequently denied.”

‘Dangerous precedent’

Under the Philippine laws, cyber libel is a bailable offence. Based on the guidelines for bail for cybercrime offences, the bail for cyber libel is typically set at P10,000 (NZ$790).

In a message to reporters, Leody de Guzman’s team said the ex-presidential candidate and Bello’s running mate was headed to QCPD Station 8 to show support for Bello.

At the height of the campaign period early this year, Jefry Tupas, Vice-President Sara Duterte’s former information officer, filed a cyber libel complaint against Bello.

She is seeking P10 million (NZ$790,000) in damages after Bello allegedly accused her on social media of being a drug addict and dealer.

Bello earlier labeled Tupas’ act as “clearly a politically-motivated move”.

In a petition for review filed on July 29, Bello’s camp argued that the position of Tupas in government “is very relevant” as the Facebook post would not have highlighted the drug raid if it weren’t for her being a public official.

Infringement on free speech
The prosecutor’s dismissal of their argument that the post merely poses a question sets “a dangerous precedent,” the petition also pointed out.

“Just imagine the severe infringement on free speech that would ensue if our jurisdiction would limit what questions people can ask!” the petition said.

Bello’s camp also argued that the post was written by his communications team, not by the former vice-presidential candidate himself, and that there is still no proof that he personally published it on Facebook.

“[Bello] does not even have administrator or moderator status in the said Facebook page,” it said.

Pacific Media Watch reports: Walden Bello posted this on his Facebook page from detention at Camp Karingal:

Seventy seven years ago today, Aug 9, 1945, the second atom bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, three days after the first blasted Hiroshima. Up to 80,000 people were killed in an act of genocide that had absolutely no military value and merely served to warn the Soviet Union of the US’ capacity to blast it to bits. The world must never forget Hiroshima and Nagasaki, especially now that the war in the Ukraine drags on, with the constant possibility of uncontrolled escalation, and Washington provokes China on Taiwan.

By Jairo Bolledo is a Rappler journalist. Republished with permission.

]]> After election defeat, Robredo to lead ‘biggest volunteer movement in Philippine history’ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2022/05/16/after-election-defeat-robredo-to-lead-biggest-volunteer-movement-in-philippine-history/ Sun, 15 May 2022 12:47:28 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=74161 By Mara Cepeda in Manila

Philippine Vice-President Leni Robredo will not allow the massive, volunteer-led movement she inspired in the 2022 presidential elections to just fade away following her loss to the late dictator’s son Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.

Facing tens of thousands of her supporters during her thanksgiving event at the Ateneo de Manila University in Quezon City on Friday, Robredo announced the creation of the Angat Buhay nongovernmental organisation, harnessing the so-called “pink revolution” her campaign inspired for the bigger battle ahead.

This NGO, set to be launched on July 1 or a day after Robredo steps down as vice president, will be named after the highly praised anti-poverty and pandemic response programme she has been running for the past six years.

“Hinding-hindi dapat pumanaw ang diwa ng ating kampanya. Ang pinakalayunin ng gobyernong tapat ay ang pag-angat ng buhay ng lahat. Kaya inaanunsyo ko ngayon ang target natin: Sa unang araw ng Hulyo, ilulunsad natin ang Angat Buhay NGO,” said Robredo, sending her “kakampink” supporters into a frenzy.

(The spirit of our campaign should never die out. The primary aim of an honest government is to uplift the lives of all. That’s why we are announcing our target: On the first day of July, we will launch the Angat Buhay NGO.)

The Vice-President plans to tap into the Robredo People’s Councils that her campaign team had strategically put up across provinces to help organise the hundreds of volunteer groups that were created for her presidential bid.

‘All is not lost’ pledge
Robredo may have lost the 2022 presidential race to her bitter rival Marcos, but she assured her supporters that all hope is not lost.

“Bubuin natin ang pinakamalawak na volunteer network sa kasaysayan ng ating bansa. Tuloy tayo sa pagtungo sa mga nasa laylayan at sa pag-ambagan para umangat sila,” said Robredo.

(We are going to build the biggest volunteer network in the history of our country. We will continue going to those on the fringes of society and working together to alleviate their lives.)

And once the Angat Buhay NGO had been been set up, it would serve all Filipinos in need, she said.

“Pero hindi tayo mamimili ng tutulungan…. Ipapakita natin ang buong puwersa ng radikal na pagmamahal,” said Robredo.

(But we will not choose who to help…. We will show them the full force of radical love.)

One of Robredo’s first campaign messages was a call for “radical love” — for her supporters to exercise sobriety and openness as they aim to convert those who were voting for another presidential contender.

It was only around mid-January of 2022 — about two weeks before the official campaign period started – that Robredo’s campaign slogan “Gobyernong Tapat, Angat Buhay Lahat (Honest Government, a Better Life for All)” was coined.

New Zealand Pinoy supporters for the Leni-Kiko presidential elections ticket
New Zealand Pinoy supporters at a Kakampink rally in Auckland’s Campbell Bay Reserve two days before the election … they are now planning a new movement that will link to Angat Buhay in the Philippines. Image: David Robie/APR

Heartbreaking loss for only woman
It was a heartbreaking loss for the lone female presidential contender, who was riding on a volunteer-spurred momentum in the crucial homestretch of the 90-day campaign. It made her critics step up their attacks, with three of her male rivals even ganging up on her in a now-infamous joint press conference on Easter Sunday.

Robredo’s presidential bid has sparked what has since been called a “pink revolution” never before seen in Philippine elections, where even Filipinos who do not usually engage in political activities saw themselves spending their own money and dedicating time just to campaign for her.

She hit the ground running when the official campaign period started. Robredo was indefatigable on the campaign trail, visiting multiple provinces in a span of a week.

She would start her day early in the morning and her grand rallies could last until midnight.

This was complemented by the massive volunteer base that Robredo attracted in the 2022 campaign. Her “kakampink” supporters organised soup kitchens, marches, motorcades, concerts, house-to-house campaigns, and grand rallies that were attended by tens of thousands – sometimes even in hundreds of thousands – across provinces.

Observers and Robredo herself likened the pink movement to the “People Power” collective effort of Filipinos in February 1986 to oust Marcos Jr’s father and namesake, the dictator Ferdinand Marcos, through a bloodless revolution.

But all of these were not enough to make Robredo the 17th president of the Philippines. This upset her supporters, many of whom continued to grieve and grapple with the election results.

But Robredo had already told them to accept the results. She then said that they should channel all their emotions into doing the necessary work needed to bring about a more meaningful change in the Philippines in the next six years.

Sociologist Jayeel Cornelio said Robredo’s post-elections call for her movement aims to counter what some political pundits believe to be a creeping authoritarianism under Marcos.

“Leni gets it. A disengaged citizenry will only embolden authoritarianism. Transforming the movement into the biggest volunteer network this country has ever seen is not only a social intervention. It is a political statement,” Cornelio tweeted.

Crusade vs disinformation
Robredo also made it clear on Friday that she would lead efforts to break the massive disinformation network on social media, rallying her “kakampinks” to join her in this crusade.

“Alam kong marami pa tayong lakas na ibubuhos. Nakikita natin ‘yan ngayong gabi. Itutuon ko ang enerhiya ko sa paglaban ng kasinungalingan at hinihiling kong samahan ninyo ako dito. Kailangan nating maging isang kilusang magtatanggol ng katotohanan,” said Robredo, sending her supporters into a frenzy.

(I know you still have a lot of strength left. We can see that tonight. I will channel my energy to fighting lies and I am asking you to join me in this fight. We need to become a movement that would defend the truth.)

Without directly mentioning any name, the Vice-President acknowledged that the Marcoses had spent years fortifying their disinformation network that sought to sanitise the Marcos regime and rid Filipinos’ memories of the atrocities committed during the Marcos dictatorship.

Studies have also showed that Robredo was the top target of these lies, which in turn benefitted Marcos’ presidential run.

Robredo believes she would need the help of the more than 14 million “kakampinks” who voted for her in the May polls to counter the well-entrenched disinformation network.

“Ang pinakamalaki nating…kalaban, namamayagpag na bago pa ng panahon ng kampanya, dahil dekadang prinoyekto. Matindi at malawak ang makinaryang kayang magpalaganap ng galit at kasinungalingan. Ninakaw nito ang katotohanan, kaya ninakaw din ang kasaysayan, pati na ang kinabukasan,” said Robredo.

(Our biggest…enemy was already dominant even before the campaign period because decades had been spent working on this. The machinery capable of spreading hate and lies is formidable. It stole the truth, so it also stole our history and our future.)

“Disimpormasyon ang isa sa pinakamalaki nating kalaban. Pero sa ngayon, maaring naghari ang makinarya ng kasinungalingan. Pero tayo lang ang makakasagot kung hanggang kailan ito maghahari. Nasa atin kung tapos na ang laban o kung nagsisimula pa lamang ito,” she said.

(Disinformation is one of our biggest enemies. For now, perhaps the machinery of lies rules. But it is up to us how long it would prevail. It is up to us to say the fight is over or if it is only just beginning.)

Mara Cepeda is a Rappler reporter. Republished with permission.

]]> Gordon Campbell: On gendered perceptions in Aotearoa politics https://asiapacificreport.nz/2022/04/18/gordon-campbell-on-gendered-perceptions-in-aotearoa-politics/ Sun, 17 Apr 2022 19:22:51 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=72952 COMMENTARY:  By Gordon Campbell

In recent weeks, barely a day has gone by without Christopher Luxon demonstrating the chasm of ability that exists between the leaders of Aotearoa New Zealand’s two major political parties. When his latest gaffe (on public transport funding) was politely pointed out to him by a NZ Herald journalist, Luxon replied: “I haven’t really thought too deeply about it, to be honest.”

Maybe that should be National’s next election campaign slogan: “Thinking Is For The Liberal Elite: Vote National!” For a party that claims to disdain mediocrity, National appears to have elevated a prime specimen of it to its top position.

Before the public transport gaffe slides down the memory hole, it is worth keeping in mind what Luxon actually said. As he told the NZ Herald: “Fundamentally, it [public transport] has got to stand on its own merits…”

When reminded public transport has been heavily subsidised in modern times, Luxon admitted he had not thought deeply on the subject. “I haven’t thought too deeply about it, to be honest. I think the bottom line is, we want to encourage more mode shift,” he said…

”Public transport needs to stand on its own feet, it can’t be subsidised or underwritten right? It has to be able to build its own case.”

What are we to make of stupidity on this scale? Leave aside the fact that public transport already stands on its merits, by providing a public service, and by helping to combat climate change.

Leave aside the fact that roads and politicians — and Air New Zealand, both now and while Luxon was CEO — are also all heavily subsidised.

Look instead at the extra costs the public would be facing from what Luxon is proposing. Transport Minister Michael Wood has spelled out some of them:

“Under Luxon’s plan a multi-zone bus fare in Auckland would go from $12.60 to $31.50, in Christchurch a $4.70 trip would become $11.75, a train ride in Wellington would go from $19 to $47.50, and superannuitants would no longer be able to use their SuperGold Card to catch off-peak and weekend public transport.”

In all likelihood, Luxon would not really follow through and do what he just said. His modus operandi is gradually becoming clear. It follows this basic pattern: what Luxon says is almost beside the point, since the gaffe (once it has been detected by other people) will be quickly followed up by a scrambled attempt to conceal the meaning his words plainly conveyed.

Essentially, the details are merely the window dressing for the slogans that take up most of the rentable space inside his noggin. Such as: Government Bad, Private Sector Good. Regulations Bad For Business, Open Slather Good For Business. Unions Bad. Farmers Good. Landlords Very Good. Climate Change Hurt My Head.

Footnote: All the same, Luxon is posing as the champion of the people fighting the cost of living pressures. Yet that pose is wildly inconsistent with what he has actually been advocating, and opposing.

As Clint Smith has pointed out, the list includes :

Luxon’s cost of living policies: – oppose the Winter Energy Payment – oppose the minimum wage hike – oppose the benefit increase – oppose Fair Pay Agreements – increase public transport prices – $2 tax cut for typical Kiwi taxpayer – $18,000 tax cut for him.

Gendered double standards
The double standard involved here is breathtaking. If a female politician said something as laughable as Luxon’s proposal on transport subsidies and defended it on the basis that she hadn’t thought about it too deeply, she would never survive the fallout.

She would be roundly damned as a scatterbrain and a show pony, and deemed plainly unfit for higher office.

Yet because Luxon is a man in a suit, and because he is the leader of a National Party that has always been suspicious of conspicuous intelligence, he is being enabled to continue on his bumbling way.

Jacinda Ardern on the other hand, is held to a different standard. Obviously, there is and should be a range of opinions on whether her government is doing the right thing. Even people who routinely vote Labour criticise it on the details and pace of change it is currently overseeing.

However, much of the most vehement criticism levelled at Ardern has little to do with policy detail and a lot to do with her gender. Her competence — which includes a command of detail across the whole range of government activity, and an ability to communicate the details succinctly — is commonly held against her.

In an excellent article on Stuff last week, Michelle Duff tackled that issue head on:

Two years into the pandemic, there is talk about the new normal. Here’s what that looks like. It is open misogyny, visible on every platform and supported and promoted by upvotes on Reddit, laughing emojis on Facebook, comments about “that woman” on LinkedIn, and someone who looks like your Aunty referring to the PM as “Cindy” and calling her a “c…”.

It is targeted and increasingly violent misogynistic abuse and threats – illustrated by but not limited to the escalation in gendered hatred directed towards Ardern – being directed at public-facing women from central and local body politicians to journalists, public servants, academics and chief executives.

Ardern is (a) the most prominent and (b) the most consistent target of the gendered hatred that Duff is talking about. Yet as Duff reports, the abuse and the escalating threats have a wider context:

The amount and tone of gendered disinformation and misogynistic abuse online has exploded since last August, constituting both a national security threat and a human rights issue that authorities are struggling to combat. It appears to be part of a concentrated effort to suppress women’s participation in public and political life, borne from far-right ideology designed to oppress women that has spread to a more mainstream audience.

“There’s an increase in the amount, and there’s an increase in the intent, and that’s to control and punish women who challenge male dominance, the Prime Minister but all women,” says Disinformation Project lead Kate Hannah. It is worse for women of colour and wāhine Māori, gender minorities and disabled women, she says.

It is a spectrum of abuse, and at one end it begins with the denigration intentionally conveyed by the use of the term “Cindy” to refer to the Prime Minister. As Duff says:

Some might find this funny, but its aim is to diminish. Massey University senior lecturer Dr Suze Wilson, who studies leadership, says no-one called John Key “Johnny,” or Chris Luxon “Chrissy,” in an attempt to infantalise or belittle them. “Right from the outset you had people saying, ‘I don’t want to be told what to do by that woman,’ with an element of ‘how dare she tell me what to do.’ That had to pre-exist for this to be possible.”

But that was petty compared to now. “What’s really tipped it is the more violent rhetoric. The straight out abusive terms, the c-word, the horse-face, the threats to kill. “It comes from this idea that if any woman comes into a position of power she’s not acting as a ‘good’ woman should — and that’s why this doesn’t only come from men, it comes from people who cleave to more traditional idea around gender roles…”

Like most of the rhetoric that characterises the anti-vaxx movement, the gun lobby and other parts of our public discourse, these extremes of politicised misogyny have been imported here from the United States — a country where religious beliefs permeate the perceptions of what are seen to be the appropriate gender roles.

I’m not implying that this alarming trend — and the double standard it entails — is the fault of Christopher Luxon. But he is definitely a beneficiary of it. Because if politics was a level playing field, Luxon wouldn’t be standing a chance against Ardern. On every conceivable measure of ability, he simply isn’t in her league.

Footnote: On that point, Luxon is often dismissed as being a John Key clone. That’s a mistake. Because what Luxon has been proposing are very hard right policies, and not the moderate centrism that enabled Key to be seen as an amiable, grinning placeholder acceptable to a wide range of voters.

Instead, Luxon and David Seymour are trying to inject policies into the political mainstream that over the past 30 years, have enjoyed only about 5-10 percent support at most. It isn’t a stretch to regard their “small government” extremism as having more than a little in common with the “That bitch can’t tell me what to do” extremism mentioned above.

Gordon Campbell is an independent progressive journalist and editor of Scoop’s Werewolf magazine. This article has been republished with the author’s permission.

]]> Christmas on the street for PNG survivor of jailed wife basher https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/12/24/christmas-on-the-street-for-png-survivor-of-jailed-wife-basher/ Fri, 24 Dec 2021 03:37:14 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=68074 By Rebecca Kuku and Marjorie Finkeo in Port Moresby

As families prepare to celebrate Christmas with their loved ones, a safe house in Papua New Guinea’s capital Port Moresby has kicked out gender-based violence survivors, leaving them homeless for the festive season.

One of the survivors, 37-year-old Gathy Peter from the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, told the PNG Post-Courier that they were informed by staff from the safe house (named) that the house would be closed for holidays.

“So for those of us who have no family here in Port Moresby, they just left us at the Boroko police station and I have been here as I have nowhere to go,” she said.

“Another woman, who had her two children with her, was also left here but she has since left the station premises.”

Peter is a mother of three, she met her husband (named) when he went to Bougainville for the crisis and they got married, and in 1997 they moved to her husband’s hometown in Southern Highlands province.

“We had three kids, one boy and two girls, but life was not good, my husband was violent, so after four years, in 2012, I took my two daughters and ran away back to Bougainville, leaving behind my son who was just nine years old at that time.”

She said that in 2017, she came to Port Moresby for work but her husband found her and forced her to move in with him again, so she moved in with him at Gereka.

Badly beaten by husband
“But the violence continued, he would tell me to remove my clothes before he started beating me, he even brought home his girlfriend to live with us, telling me that she was his niece,” Peter said.

In June this year, Peter was badly beaten by her husband, who cut her with a machete from her head down to her feet.

“He kicked me in the face when I cried out in pain — when I spat the blood out, three of my teeth fell out too.

“A neighbour came in and stopped him, and I took the opportunity to run away, and walked from Gereka to 6-Mile at around 11pm in the night.

“I passed out somewhere near 6-Mile in front of a small tucker shop.

“A woman from there assisted me to the Gordon police station to file an official report with the FSVU (Family and Sexual Violence Unit), and I was put into a safe house (named).”

With no family and friends in Port Moresby, she was left homeless but was assisted by the Boroko Juvenile Unit to win her case against her husband, who has since been sentenced to two years in prison.

In safe house for six months
Peter has been living in that safe house for more than six months but was dumped at the Boroko police station car park area.

She is living at the precinct of the Boroko police station. She is far from home and family.

“Christmas is near and I long for my children and the white sandy beaches of my home.”

Attempts made to get comments from the safe house were unsuccessful yesterday.

However, according to the sources — women who were given refuge at the safe house were all sent back to their families as the safehouse was closing for the festive season.

Only Gathy Peter and the mother of two were dropped off at Boroko Police Station as they do not have families in Port Moresby.

However, the mother of two has since been given refuge at another safe house, leaving Peter behind.

Rebecca Kuku and Marjorie Finkeo are PNG Post-Courier reporters. Republished with permission.

]]> Aftershocks of covid-19 threaten to undo gains across Pacific, says report https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/10/18/aftershocks-of-covid-19-threaten-to-undo-gains-across-pacific-says-report/ Sun, 17 Oct 2021 23:53:22 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=64893 By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific deputy news editor

Experts are warning that development gains across the Pacific region over the past 10 years could be undone due to the challenges of the covid-19 pandemic.

The aid organisation World Vision wants a once in a life time multinational effort to rebuild Pacific livelihoods that have been shattered by the pandemic.

In the Pacific Aftershocks report, World Vision reveals the results of a survey of households across the region.

The Pacific Aftershocks report
The Pacific Aftershocks report. Image: World Vision

It said while much of the Pacific had not had local cases of covid-19 there had been a tragic human cost due to the economic fallout.

World Vision New Zealand’s TJ Grant said the economic devastation could take a greater toll than the virus itself.

Grant said that while many Pacific nations managed to keep infections and transmissions at bay, vulnerable people were now facing the huge cost of closed borders and isolation.

“Almost two-thirds of households have either lost jobs or lost income and have had to resort to other alternative sources of income.

‘One in five houses skip meals’
“Related to that one in five houses is having to skip meals or having cheaper meals because they can’t afford to have a healthy diet. One of the compounding factors here is that through the covid pandemic food prices have risen significantly in many Pacific countries,” Grant said.

PNG Children on Highlands Highway
PNG children walking on the Highlands Highway. Image: Koroi Hawkins/RNZ Pacific

One of the nations worst hit by the economic downturn caused by the pandemic is Vanuatu.

World Vision’s country director in Vanuatu, Kendra Gates Derousseau, said Vanuatu had managed to keep covid out yet its food prices had soared by 30.6 percent.

She said this put healthy food out of reach for countless urban ni-Vanuatu.

“Vanuatu is quite dependent on imports, particularly for urban households that work and cannot spend their time doing agricultural gardening and featuring fresh food. And also the price of transport has gone up significantly because the importation of petrol has slowed down,” she said.

People lining up to get food supplied from Save the Children on the main island Viti Levu.
People lining up to get food supplied from Save the Children on the main island Viti Levu. Image: RNZ Pacific/Save the Children

World Vision wants Australia and New Zealand to lead a once in a generation step up to help these developing nations overcome the devastating impacts of covid.

It is looking for a comprehensive international programme of support for economic recovery and to address key economic, health and child welfare issues.

Stunted growth exacerbated
Grant said stunted growth, as a result of poor nutrition, was a perennial Pacific problem, and occurrence like the virus and its aftershocks exacerbated it.

Derousseau said New Zealand and Australia and other donor nations could not abandon the Pacific when they were most needed.

“The covid-19 pandemic is a global phenomenon as well as climate change and we know that the Pacific Island nations are extraordinarily affected — even more so than other regions of the world, and so a regional crisis like this requires a regional response.”

Roland Rajah is a development economist with Australian think tank, the Lowy Institute. He has written that the Pacific will be economically put back 10 years by the pandemic.

Vanuatu children
Ni-Vanuatu children … healthy food out of reach for countless urban ni-Vanuatu. Image: RNZ Pacific

Rajah told RNZ Pacific it was definitely among the worst affected by the lockdowns.

“Already other parts of the world, South East Asia, even sub-Saharan Africa, Latin American, the Caribbean, they are all on the rebound already,” he said.

“Their prospects for recovery are much stronger than for the Pacific. And there are a variety of reasons for that, but it’s fair to say that it’s amongst the worst affected anywhere in the world.”

He said the Pacific nations typically can’t follow the path of the developed nations and provide stimulis packages because they don’t have the funds.

But he suggests properly targetted infrastructure investment — that that is aimed at also addressing climate change — assisted by the metropolitan powers, may go some way to providing employment and incomes boosts.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

]]> 9/11 killed it, but 20 years on global justice movement is poised for revival https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/09/11/9-11-killed-it-but-20-years-on-global-justice-movement-is-poised-for-revival/ Sat, 11 Sep 2021 11:11:13 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=63404 ANALYSIS: By Kalinga Seneviratne in Sydney

Since the attacks on the United States by 15 Saudi Arabian Islamic fanatics on 11 September  2001 — now known as 9/11 —  the world has been divided by a “war on terror” with any protest group defined as “terrorists”.

New anti-terror laws have been introduced both in the West and elsewhere in the past 20 years and used extensively to suppress such movements in the name of “national security”.

It is interesting to note that the 9/11 attacks came at a time when a huge “global justice” movement was building up across the world against the injustices of globalisation.

Using the internet as the medium of mobilisation, they gathered in Seattle in 1999 and were successful in closing down the World Trade Organisation (WTO) meeting.

They opposed what they saw as large multinational corporations having unregulated political power, exercised through trade agreements and deregulated financial markets, facilitated by governments.

Their main targets were the WTO, International Monetary Fund (IMF), OECD, World Bank, and international trade agreements.

The movement brought “civil society” people from the North and the South together under common goals.

Poorest country debts
In parallel, the “Jubilee 2000” international movement led by liberal Christian and Catholic churches called for the cancellation of US$90 billion of debts owed by the world’s poorest nations to banks and governments in the West.

Along with the churches, youth groups, music, and entertainment industry groups were involved. The 9/11 attacks killed these movements as “national security” took precedence over “freedom to dissent”.

Dr Dayan Jayatilleka, a former vice-president of the UN Human Rights Council and a Sri Lankan political scientist, notes that when “capitalism turned neoliberal and went on the rampage” after the demise of the Soviet Union, resistance started to develop with the rise of the Zapatistas in Chiapas (Mexico) against NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) and culminating in the 1999 Seattle protests using a term coined by Cuban leader Fidel Castro “another world is possible”.

“All that came crashing down with the Twin Towers,” he notes. “With 9/11 the Islamic Jihadist opposition to the USA (and the war on terror) cut across and buried the progressive resistance we saw emerging in Chiapas and Seattle.”

Geoffrey Robertson QC, a British human rights campaigner and TV personality, warns: “9/11 panicked us into the ‘war on terror’ using lethal weapons of questionable legality which inspired more terrorists.

“Twenty years on, those same adversaries are back and we now have a fear of US perfidy—over Taiwan or ANZUS or whatever. There will be many consequences.”

But, he sees some silver lining that has come out of this “war on terror”.

Targeted sanctions
“One reasonably successful tactic developed in the war on terror was to use targeted sanctions on its sponsors. This has been developed by so-called ‘Magnitsky acts’, enabling the targeting of human rights abusers—31 democracies now have them and Australia will shortly be the 32nd.

“I foresee their coordination as part of the fightback—a war not on terror but state cruelty,” he told In-Depth News.

When asked about the US’s humiliation in Afghanistan, Dr Chandra Muzaffar, founder of the International Movement for a Just World told IDN that the West needed to understand that they too needed to stop funding terror to achieve their own agendas.

“The ‘war on terror’ was doomed to failure from the outset because those who initiated the war were not prepared to admit that it was their occupation and oppression that compelled others to retaliate through acts of terror.” he argues.

“Popular antagonism towards the occupiers was one of the main reasons for the humiliating defeat of the US and NATO in Afghanistan,” he added.

Looking at Western attempts to introduce democracy under the pretext of “war on terror” and the chaos created by the “Arab Spring”, a youth movement driven by Western-funded NGOs, Iranian-born Australian Farzin Yekta, who worked in Lebanon for 15 years as a community multimedia worker, argues that the Arab region needs a different democracy.

“In the Middle East, the nations should aspire to a system based on social justice rather than the Western democratic model. Corrupt political and economic apparatus, external interference and dysfunctional infrastructure are the main obstacles for moving towards establishing a system based on social justice,” he says, adding that there are signs of growing social movements being revived in the region while “resisting all kinds of attacks”.

Palestinian refugee lessons
Yekta told IDN that while working with Palestinian refugee groups in Lebanon he had seen how peoples’ movements could be undermined by so-called “civil society” NGOs.

“Alternative social movements are infested by ‘civil society’ institutions comprising primarily NGO institutions.

“‘Civil society’ is effective leverage for the establishment and foreign (Western) interference to pacify radical social movements. Social movements find themselves in a web of funded entities which push for ‘agendas’ drawn by funding buddies,” noted Yekta.

Looking at the failure of Western forces in Afghanistan, he argues that what they did by building up “civil society” was encouraging corruption and cronyism that is entangled in ethnic and tribal structures of society.

“The Western nation-building plan was limited to setting up a glasshouse pseudo-democratic space in the green zone part of Kabul.

“One just needed to go to the countryside to confront the utter poverty and lack of infrastructure,” Yekta notes.

”We need to understand that people’s struggle is occurring at places with poor or no infrastructure.”

Social movements reviving
Dr Jayatilleka also sees positive signs of social movements beginning to raise their heads after two decades of repression.

“Black Lives Matter drew in perhaps more young whites than blacks and constituted the largest ever protest movement in history. The globalised solidarity with the Palestinian people of Gaza, including large demonstrations in US cities, is further evidence.

“In Latin America, the left-populist Pink Tide 2.0 began with the victory of Lopez Obrador in Mexico and has produced the victory of Pedro Castillo in Peru.

“The slogan of justice, both individual and social, is more globalised, more universalised today, than ever before in my lifetime,” he told IDN.

There may be ample issues for peoples’ movements to take up with TPP (Transpacific Partnership) and RCEP (Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership) trade agreements coming into force in Asia where companies would be able to sue governments if their social policies infringe on company profits.

But Dr Jayatilleka is less optimistic of social movements rising in Asia.

Asian social inequities
“Sadly, the social justice movement is considerably more complicated in Asia than elsewhere, though one would have assumed that given the social inequities in Asian societies, the struggle for social justice would be a torrent. It is not,” he argues.

“The brightest recent spark in Asia, according to Dr Jayatilleka, was the rise of the Nepali Communist Party to power through the ballot box after a protracted peoples’ war, but ‘sectarianism’ has led to the subsiding of what was the brightest hope for the social justice movement in Asia.”

Robertson feels that the time is ripe for the social movements suppressed by post 9/11 anti-terror laws to be reincarnated in a different life.

“The broader demand for social justice will revive, initially behind the imperative of dealing with climate change but then with tax havens, the power of multinationals, and the obscene inequalities in the world’s wealth.

“So, I do not despair of social justice momentum in the future,” he says.

Republished under Creative Commons partnership with IDN – In-Depth News.

]]> Seymour’s sabotage of Māori priority vaccine code ‘unbelievably cruel’ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/09/08/seymours-leak-of-maori-priority-vaccine-code-unbelievably-cruel/ Wed, 08 Sep 2021 06:18:15 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=63182 Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

A Māori political leader has branded opposition neoliberal ACT leader David Seymour’s act this week undermining an indigenous response to New Zealand’s covid-19 pandemic as  “unbelievably irresponsible and cruel”.

Seymour publicly shared a priority vaccine code for Māori so that Pākehā, or non-Māori, could jump the queue for vaccinations against the virus.

“Political differences aside, it’s hard to understand why a leader with whakapapa continuously chooses not to protect it,” said Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, co-leader and whip of Te Pāti Māori.

ACT party leader David Seymour
ACT party leader David Seymour … “privileged, and … chose to appeal to the fascist New Zealander.” Image: The Daily Blog

Writing in The New Zealand Herald today, she said there had been early signs of inequities in the government’s covid vaccination rollout for Māori and Pasifika.

She cited health specialists arguing that the government’s one-shoe-fits-all vaccine rollout was an “overwhelming failure”.

The failure resulted in “just 19 percent of eligible Māori [being] vaccinated by the end of Tuesday, compared to 30.4 percent of eligible people in the ‘European or other’ category,” Ngarewa-Packer wrote.

Fifteen percent of New Zealand’s population 5 million are Māori, the country’s First Nation people.

‘Conscious decision to sabotage’
“This is where David Seymour made a conscious decision to sabotage. He not only underestimated the manaaki our Māori hauora [health] providers have for everyone in their communities, but also the solutions to address vaccination disparity and the success that came with it.”

The very centre that Seymour had launched a full-scale attack on had a vaccination uptake of 85 percent Pākehā, vaccinating five times fewer Māori than non-Māori.

“His poor understanding that a Māori-targeted-approach is not anti-Pākehā, exclusive or segregated shows his absolute desperation to compete for the ‘disillusioned white’ voter,” Ngarewa-Packer said.

“He launched a political missile that fast became a political SOS.”

Ngarewa-Packer said she was just 12 months out of personally leading a covid response and standing up iwi checkpoints.

“I appreciate how much effort logistically and mentally goes into leading a response effort,” she said.

“It takes a team who is prepared to work outside of normal hours to serve their community and one who believes with a passion that they must, and indeed can.

Poor vaccination uptake
“Our pāti [political party] with many other leaders, continually raised concern with how poor vaccination uptake was for Māori [and Pasifika].

“With a third of our population living in poverty and a third under-employed, the luxury of fuelling a car to travel five hours for vaccination versus putting food on the table was not an option.

“I live in a community where many don’t own smartphones or have data access to book vaccinations, some can’t afford to travel over an hour to their closest urban medical facilities.

“Access issues for many whānau are real, as are inequities. But the reality is Seymour’s neighbourhood is vastly different to those he attacked.’

"Māori job inequity"
“Māori job inequity” … vaccination statistics may be even worse. Image: NZ Herald screenshot APR

Seymour is MP for Epsom in Auckland, one of New Zealand’s wealthiest electorates, and has been leader of the rightwing party ACT since 2014.

“He is privileged, and rather than empathise to understand some very real-life challenges, he instead chose to appeal to the fascist New Zealander, to the wealthy who have health insurance, to the 35 percent who no-showed to appointments, to the very elite who designed this vaccination system.”

Ngarewa-Packer said the access code had nothing to do with skin colour but rather the systemic issues that Māori “consistently confront as a population – with higher rates of deprivation and mortality”.

Always considered expendable
“And sadly, it doesn’t matter how hard we work to protect the team of five million or put others before our own. The sad reality is, when it comes to addressing our own needs, it is presented as preferential. We are always considered expendable.”

Ngarewa-Packer also referred to the sacrifices that the famous Maori Battalion had made for the protection of the people of Aotearoa during both World Wars.

“The Māori Battalion was a formidable fighting force, highly regarded for all they did on the allies’ frontline to protect our nationhood. Their sacrifice for us is forever treasured.”

That sacrifice had been hoped that it would “give us full respected rights alongside Pākehā, as [the 1840 foundation] Te Tiriti [of Waitangi] intended”.

All covid-19 vaccinations are free in New Zealand.

15 new community cases
RNZ News reports that Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield reported 15 new community cases of covid-19 in the country in New Zealand today.

Speaking at today’s media conference, Dr Bloomfield said there were now 855 cases in the current community outbreak and 218 cases were deemed to have recovered.

There were 21 new cases reported yesterday, and 20 on three days in a row before that.

NZ government covid-19 advert
New Zealand government advert promoting its “working” covid policy over the delta variant … 15 community cases today, down again. Image: NZ govt
]]> Auckland’s ‘most liveable’ city loses some gloss with Pacific criticism https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/06/18/aucklands-most-liveable-city-loses-some-gloss-with-pacific-criticism/ Thu, 17 Jun 2021 23:26:29 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=59423 Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

Days after being condemned by the largest Pacific Island capital — Port Moresby, the Economist’s Global Liveability Index has been criticised in Auckland by one of New Zealand’s most respected “green” columnists.

The criticisms come from different ends of the spectrum — Port Moresby was third to last in the 140-nation survey while Auckland, with the world’s largest urban Polynesian population, was top.

Both results were thanks to city responses to the global covid-19 pandemic.

National Capital District Governor Powes Parkop had roasted the Economist index, criticising the “irresponsible” criteria used in in the index assessment and called for a rethink about his sprawling city of Port Moresby (pop. 391,000).

“This is a harsh verdict on our city, which we have worked so hard to build,” Parkop said.

Leading Māori academic Associate Professor Ella Henry of Auckland University of Technology also criticised the criteria saying few indigenous tangata whenua people would agree with Auckland/Tāmaki Makaurau (pop. 1.6 million, with 11.5 percent Māori) being the world’s “most liveable” city.

“In particular, I would argue that many Māori whānau in Auckland do not enjoy the benefits of this supposed ‘liveability’,” she said, citing negative employment, health, housing, poverty and digital divide statistics.

Global ‘low bar’
However, while New Zealand Herald commentator Simon Wilson, celebrated for his environmentally progressive views on Auckland, today welcomed his city’s success, he also  criticised the global “low bar” that had contributed to the Economist result.

“It sure puts covid into perspective, doesn’t it? Auckland … is now the world’s most liveable city. And it’s all because of our response to the pandemic,” he wrote.

“Britain has just delayed lifting all restrictions by another month. The fast rollout of vaccines in the US has stalled at around 50 percent, because nobody really knows how to persuade the remaining half of the population to get the jab.

“European and Asian countries alike slide in and out of covid crises. The nightmare that is India seems almost beyond redemption. This is a terrible tragedy.

“Here in Tāmaki Makaurau, meanwhile, we enjoy the luxury of debating the future of yachting contests, school zones and cycling on the harbour bridge.

“Yes, for now and at least into the near future, Auckland has every reason to think of itself as the world’s most liveable city. But the bar is very low.”

Wilson also wrote that it was not very encouraging that the Japanese city of Osaka had been placed second on the index.

What to crow about?
“The Japanese city has uncontrolled covid and is set to be half submerged by even a minimal rise in sea levels,” he observed.

“Here [in Auckland], though, setting covid aside, what else have we got to crow, or complain, about?” Wilson continued.

“We’re tremendously liveable, obviously, if you own property – and cruelly not so if you don’t. We’re tremendously liveable if your life doesn’t oblige you to get stuck in traffic, but not so much, etc.

“Some of us have reasonably well-paid future-focused jobs while others of us are precariously clinging to the gig economy, or are on minimum wage, or are not in the productive economy at all.

“The fact is, measuring liveability is a spurious business. The only markers that count should be the ones that acknowledge we’re doing well when we’re all doing well.”

]]> Locke invested with NZ Order of Merit for his human rights advocacy https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/04/23/locke-invested-with-nz-order-of-merit-for-his-human-rights-advocacy/ Fri, 23 Apr 2021 04:04:57 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=56816 Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

The Governor-General, Dame Patsy Reddy, this week invested social justice advocate and former Green Party MP Keith Locke as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit “for services to human rights advocacy”.

Locke described the the award in the New Year Honours list as recognition of the great work of human rights advocates in the many organisations he had worked in, such as those mentioned in the tribute read out at the ceremony.

“Mr Keith Locke has been a long-term human rights activist at both national and international levels,” said the citation.

“Mr Locke became the National Co-ordinator of the Philippines Solidarity Network from 1986 to 1991 and created exchange programmes between social justice groups in New Zealand and their counterparts in the Philippines.

“Around this time he opened the progressive One World Books store, which provided a hub for activists in Auckland.

“He was Secretary of the Wellington Latin America Committee from 1980 to 1985.

In the 1990s he was a Foreign Affairs spokesperson for the NewLabour, Alliance and Green parties and was a Green Member of Parliament between 1999 and 2011.

“During this time, he advocated on politically unpopular international human rights issues and drew attention to human rights abuses in Tibet, China, East Timor, Fiji, Sri Lanka, and the Middle East.

“He was recognised by Amnesty International with the Human Rights Defender Award in 2012 and the Harmony Award from the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand in 2013.

“Since retiring from Parliament, Mr Locke has served on the Boards of the Auckland Refugee Council from 2012 to 2017 and the New Zealand Peace and Conflict Studies Centre Trust until 2019.”

]]> Brendon Blue: Non-homeowners are paying the cost of the covid-19 recovery https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/03/26/brendon-blue-non-homeowners-are-paying-the-cost-of-the-covid-19-recovery/ Thu, 25 Mar 2021 11:28:32 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=56247 ANALYSIS: By Brendon Blue for The Democracy Project

The day after New Zealand’s first lockdown was announced, I expressed to a senior colleague my concern for those around the country whose livelihoods would suffer as a result.

She agreed, but was confident that the spirit of “we’re all in it together” accompanying these drastic public health interventions would allow the government to lead the country towards a kinder, more equitable society.

“I think we might see a universal basic income,” she said hopefully.

As it turns out, the government had little appetite for progressive welfare or tax reform.

Instead, working with the Reserve Bank, they have propped up the economy through a combination of measures that have drastically inflated the price of houses.

This has most likely protected some jobs, but it has also made work increasingly irrelevant as capital gains completely outstrip wages. The wealthy have been made even wealthier, while many can no longer afford a roof over their heads.

In the past year, the average New Zealander effectively lost $54.59 for every hour they turned up to work if they did not own a home.

According to Stats NZ, the median worker earned $26.44 per hour before tax in 2020. That comes to $21.49 per hour after tax if working a 40 hour week.

Median house prices
Meanwhile, in the year to end of February 2021, the median nationwide house price increased from $640,000 to $780,000: a difference of $140,000. If houses took weekends, public holidays and four weeks’ leave off each year – which of course they do not but it makes the calculation simpler – that makes an hourly rate equivalent to $76.08 per hour. Tax-free.

This is a direct result of the decision to support the economy through a combination of quantitative easing, a reduced Official Cash Rate and wage subsidies, instead of meaningfully increasing spending on things we need such as infrastructure and welfare.

The government handed out money to the banks, effectively at no cost, allowing them to lend more at increasingly attractive rates.

The government also bought bonds at the same time, devaluing deposits and making it pointless to keep money in the bank. This combination of easy credit and disincentivised saving caused a large amount of money to start sloshing around looking for somewhere to go.

The traditional concern with this approach to stimulus is that it will inflate the price of goods and services, increasing the cost of living.

In New Zealand, though, we like to buy houses. A tax system that drastically favours property ownership, combined with a cultural sensibility that houses are a safe bet, has seen much of this newly available money pumped straight into the housing market.

A feature
This is a feature, not a bug.

It represents a new, more interventionist version of trickle-down economics for the 2020s. Decried in 2011 by Labour MP Damien O’Connor as “the rich pissing on the poor”, politicians from the right have long argued that if the wealthy feel wealthier, their increased spending will benefit those less well off.

Generally used to advocate for reduced taxes on the rich, these ‘trickle down’ arguments refuse to die, no matter how comprehensively and repeatedly they are discredited.

This revival of trickle-down economics is a little different, as it is based on direct stimulus rather than a reduction in tax, but the effective mechanism is the same.

House price inflation is desirable, we are told, because homeowners feeling the resulting “wealth effect” will spend more on the goods and services provided by other New Zealanders. The win-win logic of this argument hides the fact that, fundamentally, someone is paying a heavy price.

Another way to think about it is that the government has effectively paid for covid-19 by levying a special tax on anyone who wants to live in New Zealand, but did not happen to own property during the summer of 2020/21, and handing that money to homeowners.

Paying the price
Many will pay this price throughout their lives. Some will be consigned to renting forever, handing over ever-increasing portions of their incomes to landlords seeking increased yield from their value-inflated properties.

Too many won’t even be able to do that, and sleeping on the street or in emergency accommodation. The relatively lucky few who do manage to buy a home will have mortgages hundreds of thousands of dollars larger than they otherwise would, spreading the cost of covid across their entire lifetimes.

Even as the beneficiaries of this covid levy, most homeowners are unable to simply stop working and enjoy this newfound wealth.

They may feel that they cannot realise their capital gain because it is tied up in their family home. What this windfall does provide, however, is choice: the option to release some of their newfound capital by downsizing into somewhere cheaper, or to stay put, taking advantage of the extra equity to fund lifestyle improvements like a new boat, a bach or a remodelled kitchen.

Unprecedented demand for watercraft this summer suggests that many are doing exactly this.

It can be tempting to view this growing inequity as just another “baby boomers vs millennials” issue. Certainly, it does represent a massive transfer of wealth from generally younger New Zealanders who do not currently own homes, to the largely older folk who were able to buy homes cheaply in the past.

This disparity is reflected in Westpac’s latest consumer confidence figures, which show that younger New Zealanders are far more likely to be worried about their financial situation compared with older cohorts.

Patronising advice about avoiding avocados and food delivery services to save for a home entirely misses this point. Nonetheless, it is important to note that many older New Zealanders also live in poverty while subject to similarly individualising narratives of self-control.

Social divide
Perhaps the more important question is how this rapidly accumulating wealth will be deployed to further entrench a growing social divide.

Parents with equity to spare are increasingly using it to help their children “get on the property ladder”. On an individual basis this is an entirely reasonable thing to do.

At a larger scale, though, the competitive advantage conferred by having generous, wealthy parents makes it even harder for those who do not have such privilege to obtain a home. Many are being left behind as a new landed gentry takes shape.

These political-economic arrangements favouring existing wealth over hard work have been a long time in the making, beginning well before most of the current crop of politicians arrived in parliament.

It is notable, though, that a government that promised to address the “housing crisis” has actively and knowingly pursued policies that have produced an unprecedented upward step-change in the market.

Perhaps most concerning is that the Prime Minister has expressed her intent that house price inflation should continue, just at a more “moderate” rate, because that’s what “people expect”.

It is exactly these expectations that are the problem: these issues will not be resolved while houses remain a speculative investment vehicle, rather than a home.

Class of investors
A substantial class of investors have certainly been made exceptionally wealthy by the covid-19 response, even as those who work for a living have seen their incomes stagnate. Image: David Robie/Café Pacific

‘Tipping the balance’
Tuesday’s announcement of measures to “tip the balance” towards home buyers, rather than investors, might begin to signal a growing recognition that housing is more than an investment.

A substantial class of investors have certainly been made exceptionally wealthy by the covid-19 response, even as those who work for a living have seen their incomes stagnate.

But while this separation of ‘investors’ or ‘speculators’ from ‘homeowners’ might be politically convenient, it makes something of a false distinction.

Whether a house is owned as a home, or purely a source of income, any non-improvement appreciation in value comes at someone else’s expense.

Until New Zealand acknowledges this, little will change: whoever is in charge, and no matter how many new homes get built.

Covid-19 has shown that when politicians want to act, they certainly can. As many others have pointed out, this government promised “transformational change”. I’m not sure that taking money from those with the least, handing it to those with the most, is quite the kindness my colleague had in mind.

Dr Brendon Blue is a geographer in Te Kura Tātai Aro Whenua, the School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences at Te Herenga Waka, Victoria University of Wellington. He mostly studies and teaches the politics of environmental science and restoration, but would have been better off owning a house instead. This article was first published on The Democracy Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons licence.

]]> Bryan Bruce: NZ’s housing crisis – ask the right questions and we may get solutions https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/03/24/bryan-bruce-nzs-housing-crisis-ask-the-right-questions-and-we-may-get-solutions/ Tue, 23 Mar 2021 11:00:37 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=56236 COMMENTARY: By Bryan Bruce

You can’t get the right answer if you keep asking the wrong question.

A question this neoliberal New Zealand government and previous ones continue to ask is:
“How can people get to own a home?”

There are very, very limited answers to that question.

But if you ask: “How can we give people security of tenure in a healthy, warm, dry, afforable home?” then lots of alterative answers emerge.

Such as long term leasing.

This would mean not relying on Mum and Dad private investors to house our people but creating large government funding mechanisms, eg. by insisting that the Superannuation Fund invest a set percentage of their profits in long term housing investments and reinstating the State Advances Corporation.

In short the government has to regain control of the mortgage market it abdicated to the privately owned banks in thhe early 1980s

This approach has worked in Berlin for example where citizens get lifelong leases on their apartments at government controlled and affordable rents (and, yes, people can decorate their homes as they wish as long as they don’t make structural alterations.)

You can find out about other solutions to our housing problems by watching my documentary Who Owns New Zealand Now? which I made almost 5 years ago now. (Especially the last couple of parts which deal with solutions).

Asia Pacific Report republishes occasional commentaries by journalist and documentary maker Bryan Bruce with permission.

]]> Shilo Kino: Your mana diminishes every time you switch on the news https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/01/30/your-mana-diminishes-every-time-you-turn-on-the-news/ Fri, 29 Jan 2021 21:17:44 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=54215 COMMENT: By Shilo Kino

What were you doing during the foreshore and seabed hīkoi in 2004?

I wish I could say I was at the protest, gripping the hem of Nana’s dress while she raised her fist in the air, marching for sovereignty, echoing the cries of our tīpuna who were fighting for the very same thing on the very same whenua all those years ago.

But this wasn’t the reality for me and for so many other urban Māori who grew up disconnected from our culture. I was living in Avondale, Auckland and watched the protest unfold on the news. Mum was still at work and I was eating noodles, my homework spread out on the dinner table.

Sir Pita Sharples
Sir Pita Sharples leads the 2004 hikoi protesting against the foreshore and seabed legislation. Image: Newsroom/Getty Images

A sea of black and white flags flying in the air came on the TV. I remember a wave of emotion coming over me from seeing the crowds of brown faces who looked like me, who looked like my mum, my Nana.

I wish I could say it was a feeling of pride but it wasn’t. I felt whakamā – a word every Māori knows because it is an emotion that has been forced upon us to feel inherently bad for who we are.

The news coverage of the foreshore and seabed told me Māori were greedy, wanted special privileges, were angry over nothing and were trying to ban the public from beaches. It didn’t speak of Māori relationship to the land, the history of land confiscation, the fight for sovereignty or the issues that have come from colonisation and dispossession.

It was a narrative carefully formulated by the media for the intended target audience which was, you guessed it: Pākehā.

Misframing a story just one example
Weaponising activism through misframing a story is just one example. We were also sold a narrative that Māori are the criminals, the baby killers, the gang members, the underachievers, the prisoners, the drug and alcohol addicts.

What do you think this does to a person when you are constantly fed a false narrative of your identity? Your mana diminishes every time you switch on the news, open the newspaper, turn on the radio. Even worse, what happens when you are a child?

The media didn’t care how this narrative would impact me or the thousands of other Māori growing up in urban cities, unsure of who we were, no grandparents alive to teach us our identity, busy parents trying to push us into mainstream because that’s what they were told would be “best” for us and so we were forced to learn about who we are through the eyes of the media. And it wasn’t pretty.

Many years have passed since the foreshore and seabed hīkoi, yet in the year 2021 the same racism exists today, instigated by the same institutions that continue to push this same, tired narrative.

Joe Bloggs calls up a radio station well known to be racist to Māori and says “they’re (Māori) victims of their own genetic background. They are genetically predisposed to crime, alcohol, and underperformance educationally” – and the radio host who used to be the Mayor of Auckland doubles down and says something equally, if not more, racist.

This incident is not shocking to Māori, because we have heard this our whole lives. The question we should be asking ourselves is: How have we allowed the media to get away with this for so long? The continual, blatant attacks against Māori from this particular station have been among the biggest contributors to racism in this country.

Dame Whina Cooper photo
A group of students hold the iconic photo of Dame Whina Cooper taken by Micheal Tubberty at the 1975 land march, the previous big hikoi. Image: Newsroom/Getty Images

There are many examples of racism from this network but I’m not about to dive into its racist history, because I’m tired. We. Are. Tired. Google the radio hosts, look at their Twitter feeds, turn on talkback at any time of the day and the same, racist rhetoric will be there.

Network needs to stop hiding
John Banks deserves criticism but the network needs to stop hiding behind the facade of this being an individual problem. There are many John Banks who come in different forms, some working in the media who get to say whatever they want under the guise of “free speech”. Even the Christchurch terrorist attacks, where a white supremacist murdered 51 people could only keep these people quiet for one week before the station went back to regular, racist programming.

So what happens now? I can predict what will happen because this is the same vicious, ugly cycle. The racist outburst goes viral, there is some outrage. Advertisers pull out, there’s a loss of revenue, the network apologises. The person is fired. Then it happens again the next day, the next week, the next month. It seems it is much more convenient to take out the individual rather than address the racist and colonial system that exists within our media and institutions.

It’s good to see the outpouring of support from Pākehā but we need more than empathy. We need action. You get to feel outraged for a day and then go home and forget about it and not think about it again. Māori can’t switch it off. We experience racism in our workplaces, in everyday life and we have to turn on the media and see it there too.

How many more racist outbursts do you need to hear before something is done? How many more articles do you need to read before there is change?

This isn’t a matter of opinion. This is about human rights.

Shilo Kino is a reporter and the author of her new book The Pōrangi Boy, released last month with Huia publishers. She writes about social issues, justice and identity. This article was first published by Newsroom and is republished on Asia Pacific Report with the author’s permission.
Twitter: @shilokino

]]> We are the 1% – the wealth of many Australians puts them in an elite club wrecking the planet https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/01/27/we-are-the-1-the-wealth-of-many-australians-puts-them-in-an-elite-club-wrecking-the-planet/ Tue, 26 Jan 2021 21:19:38 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=54106 ANALYSIS: By Alex Baumann, Western Sydney University and Samuel Alexander, University of Melbourne

Among the many hard truths exposed by covid-19 is the huge disparity between the world’s rich and poor. As economies went into freefall, the world’s billionaires increased their already huge fortunes by 27.5 percent.

And as many ordinary people lost their jobs and fell into poverty, The Guardian reported “the 1 percent are coping” by taking private jets to their luxury retreats.

Such perverse affluence further fuelled criticism of the so-called 1 percent, which has long been the standard rhetoric of the political Left.

In 2011, Occupy Wall Street protesters called out growing economic inequality by proclaiming: “We are the 99 percent!”. And an Oxfam report in September last year lamented how the richest 1 percent of the world’s population are responsible for more than twice as much carbon pollution as the poorest half of humanity.

But you might be surprised to find this 1 percent doesn’t just comprise the super-rich. It may include you, or people you know. And this fact has big implications for social justice and planetary survival.

People crossing the street in Sydney
Many everyday Australians have a net worth that puts them in the world’s richest 1 percent. Image: The Conversation/Shutterstock

Look in the mirror
When you hear references to the 1 percent, you might think of billionaires such as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos or Tesla founder Elon Musk. However, as of October last year there were 2189 billionaires worldwide — a minuscule proportion of the 7.8 billion people on Earth.

So obviously, you don’t have to be a billionaire to join this global elite.

So how rich do you have to be? Well, Credit Suisse’s Global Wealth Report in October last year showed an individual net worth of US$1 million (A$1,295,825) – combined income, investments and personal assets — will make you among the world’s 1 percent richest people.

The latest official data shows Australia’s richest 20 percent of households have an average net worth of A$3.2 million. The average Australian household has a net worth of A$1,022,200, putting them just outside the world’s richest 1 percent.

Aerial view of suburban Australian homes
The net worth of many Australians puts them in the global elite. Image: The Conversation/Shutterstock

If you’ve just done the sums and fall outside the 1 percent, don’t feel too sorry for yourself. A net wealth of US$109,430 (A$147,038) puts you among the world’s richest 10 percent. Most Australians fit into this category; half of us have a net worth of A$558,900 or more.

What does all this mean for the planet?
It’s true the per capita emissions of the super-rich are likely to be far greater than others in the top 1 percent. But this doesn’t negate the uncomfortable fact Australians are among a fraction of the global population monopolising global wealth. This group causes the vast bulk of the world’s climate damage.

A 2020 Oxfam report shows the world’s richest 10 percent produce a staggering 52 percent of total carbon emissions. Consistent with this, a 2020 University of Leeds study found richer households around the world tend to spend their extra money on energy-intensive products, such as package holidays and car fuel. The UN’s 2020 Emission Gap Report further confirmed this, finding the top 10 percent use around 75 percent of all aviation energy and 45 percent of all land transport energy.

It’s clear that wealth, and its consequent energy privilege, is neither socially just nor ecologically sustainable.

Man with one shiny shoe and one scruffy shoe
Global wealth disparity is not just or sustainable. Image: The Conversation/Shutterstock

A potential solution
Much attention and headlines are devoted to the unethical wealth of billionaires. And while the criticism is justified, it distracts from a broader wealth problem — including our own.

We should note here, one can have an income that’s large compared to the global average, and still experience significant economic hardship. For instance in Australia, the housing costs of more than one million households exceed 30 percent of total income – the commonly used benchmark for housing affordability.

Here lies a central challenge. Even if we wanted to reduce our wealth, the enormous cost of keeping a roof over our head prevents us from doing so. Servicing a mortgage or paying rent is one of our biggest financial obligations, and a key driver in the pursuit of wealth.

But as we’ve shown above, as personal wealth grows, so too does environmental devastation. The rule even applies to the lowest paid, who are working just to pay the rent. The industries they rely on, such as retail, tourism and hospitality, are themselves associated with environmental damage.

Existing economic and social structures mean stepping off this wealth-creating treadmill is almost impossible. However as we’ve written before, people can be liberated from their reliance on economic growth when land – the very foundation of our security – is not commodified.

For social justice and ecological survival, we must urgently experiment with new land and housing strategies, to make possible a lifestyle of reduced wealth and consumption and increased self-sufficiency.

This might include urban commons, such as the R-Urban project in Paris, where several hundred people co-manage land that includes a small farm for collective use, a recycling plant and cooperative eco-housing.

The R-Urban project in Paris
The R-Urban project in Paris, which includes a small farm. Image: The Conversation/Flickr

Under a new land strategy, other ways of conserving resources could be deployed. One such example, developed by Australian academic Ted Trainer, involves cutting our earnings sharply – with paid work for only two days in a week. For the rest of the working week, we would tend to community food gardens, network and share many things we currently consume individually.

Such a way of living could help us re-evaluate the amount of wealth we need to live well.

The social and ecological challenges the world faces cannot be exaggerated. New thinking and creativity is needed. And the first step in this journey is taking an honest look at whether our own wealth and consumption habits are contributing to the problem.
The Conversation

Dr Alex Baumann is a casual academic, School of Social Sciences & Psychology, Western Sydney University and Samuel Alexander, Research fellow, Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, University of Melbourne. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

]]> ‘Walk the talk’ human rights warning from Fiji NGO over UN chair https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/01/19/walk-the-talk-human-rights-warning-from-fiji-ngo-over-un-chair/ Tue, 19 Jan 2021 03:05:42 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=53925 Pacific Media Watch newsdesk

Fiji’s NGO Coalition on Human Rights has called for stronger accountability and commitment to human rights at home in response to the country taking the world stage as the head of a UN body.

The UN Human Rights Council (UNHCR) elected Fiji’s ambassador Nazhat Shameem Khan as its 2021 president on Friday.

“As the president of the UNHCR, Fiji now faces global scrutiny on our human rights obligations,” said the NGOCHR chair Nalini Singh in a statement.

“This is a welcome opportunity for Fiji to reflect on our progress and the existing human rights concerns that need to be addressed.”

It was encouraging to witness a small Pacific island nation like Fiji taking the lead at a global forum and representing key regional human rights issues, she said.

“It is also a critical time for the Pacific and Fiji, as we see the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic exacerbating human rights issues in the region.

Fiji ‘must act over justice’
“With Fiji’s new appointment, our government must act to ensure that human rights and the principles of equality and justice are upheld across all sectors,” said Singh.

A recent concern has been cases of alleged police brutality that have been raised by the NGOCHR.

The NGOCHR has reaffirmed that there must be “no rollback of human rights” under the guise of response measures and continues to raise concerns on the arrests of Fiji citizens during the nation-wide curfew.

“We are at the world stage taking a strong stance on human rights but we must walk the talk here at home and set the example,” said Singh.

Fiji’s selection as the President of the UNHCR is a step forward in the right direction and we must keep this momentum to foster a culture that promotes and protects human rights, justice and democracy.

]]> K Road Chronicles – looking at NZ’s homelessness from the inside https://asiapacificreport.nz/2021/01/17/k-road-chronicles-looking-at-nzs-homelessness-from-the-inside/ Sat, 16 Jan 2021 23:00:43 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=53884 K Road Chronicles video produced by Stuff with NZ On Air.

By RNZ’s The Weekend with Karyn Hay

The K Road Chronicles is a New Zealand webseries that delves into what it is like to be homeless on the streets of inner city Auckland.

Now in its second season, the show is hosted by Six – who knows the experience of homelessness firsthand, having lived on the streets for six years.

Six, an AUT journalism graduate and founder of the K Road Chronicle newspaper for homeless people, joins Karyn in the studio to discuss making the series.

By Jessie Chiang, RNZ News reporter

Living on the fringes
FLASHBACK TO 2017 REPORT: Homeless people and those living on the fringes in central Auckland have their own newspaper for the first time.

K Road Chronicle tells the stories of the Karangahape Road community.

The Chronicle’s editor, Six, said the monthly newspaper was about giving the homeless a voice and breaking down any prejudices the public may have about them.

“It educates the wider audience on who these people are and what they’re stories are and what’s significant to them,” she said.

Six, editor of the K Road Chronicle
Six, the editor of the K Road Chronicle, pictured on Karangahape Road. Image: Jessie Chiang/RNZ

“Even though it focuses mainly on K Road and stories from the street, it’s about everybody who uses the street whether they live there or work there.”

So far 1000 copies have been printed and are being given free to those sleeping rough to sell.

Six said just the other day she gave a few copies to someone on the street to sell and it was rewarding to see the difference it made.

“He sat up and he was excited to be giving out these newspapers and I think it gave him a purpose,” she said.

“I caught up with him a few hours later and I said, ‘how’s it going?’ and he said, ‘I made 20 bucks’ and that’s great because he could be sitting there all there and make five or 10 dollars.”

K Road Chronicle
The paper was started with initial funding from the K Road Business Association. Image: Jessie Chiang/RNZ

Rob, who usually asks for money on K Road, has also been selling the Chronicle.

He said it was great to be able to offer people something that represented him as well as putting money in his pocket.

“They give me koha and before they read it, they ask me what it’s all about so I explain it to them,” he said.

“I say it’s all about the community and [it’s] ideas and thoughts.”

The newspaper was started with initial funding from the K Road Business Association.

“This publication really identifies the community and speaks to the community enhancement aspect of what we do,” said manager Michael Richardson. “It really speaks to what happens here at Karangahape Road.

Richardson said he was in talks with other organisations which were keen to donate funds to the newspaper.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

]]> The Great Divider: Covid-19 reflects global racism, not equality https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/12/23/the-great-divider-covid-19-reflects-global-racism-not-equality/ Tue, 22 Dec 2020 23:46:10 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=53266 ANALYSIS: By Ramzy Baroud

The notion that the covid-19 pandemic was “the great equalizer’ should be dead and buried by now. If anything, the lethal disease is another terrible reminder of the deep divisions and inequalities in our societies.

That said, the treatment of the disease should not be a repeat of the same shameful scenario.

For an entire year, wealthy celebrities and government officials have been reminding us that “we are in this together”, that “we are on the same boat”, with the likes of US singer, Madonna, speaking from her mansion while submerged in a “milky bath sprinkled with rose petals,” telling us that the pandemic has proved to be the “great equalizer”.

“Like I used to say at the end of ‘Human Nature’ every night, we are all in the same boat,” she said. “And if the ship goes down, we’re all going down together,” CNN reported at the time.

Such statements, like that of Madonna, and Ellen DeGeneres as well, have generated much media attention not just because they are both famous people with a massive social media following but also because of the obvious hypocrisy in their empty rhetoric.

In truth, however, they were only repeating the standard procedure followed by governments, celebrities and wealthy “influencers” worldwide.

But are we, really, “all in this together”? With unemployment rates skyrocketing across the globe, hundreds of millions scraping by to feed their children, multitudes of nameless and hapless families chugging along without access to proper healthcare, subsisting on hope and a prayer so that they may survive the scourges of poverty – let alone the pandemic – one cannot, with a clear conscience, make such outrageous claims.

Not only are we not “on the same boat” but, certainly, we have never been. According to World Bank data, nearly half of the world lives on less than US$5.5 a day. This dismal statistic is part of a remarkable trajectory of inequality that has afflicted humanity for a long time.

The plight of many of the world’s poor is compounded in the case of war refugees, the double victims of state terrorism and violence and the unwillingness of those with the resources to step forward and pay back some of their largely undeserved wealth.

The boat metaphor is particularly interesting in the case of refugees; millions of them have desperately tried to escape the infernos of war and poverty in rickety boats and dinghies, hoping to get across from their stricken regions to safer places.

Sadly familiar sight
This sight has sadly grown familiar in recent years not only throughout the Mediterranean Sea but also in other bodies of water around the world, especially in Burma, where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have tried to escape their ongoing genocide. Thousands of them have drowned in the Bay of Bengal.

The covid-19 pandemic has accentuated and, in fact, accelerated the sharp inequalities that exist in every society individually, and the world at large. According to a June 2020 study conducted in the United States by the Brookings Institute, the number of deaths as a result of the disease reflects a clear racial logic.

Many indicators included in the study leave no doubt that racism is a central factor in the life cycle of covid.

For example, among those aged between 45 and 54 years, “Black and Hispanic/Latino death rates are at least six times higher than for whites”. Although whites make up 62 percent of the US population of that specific age group, only 22 percent of the total deaths were white.

Black and Latino communities were the most devastated.

According to this and other studies, the main assumption behind the discrepancy of infection and death rates resulting from covid among various racial groups in the US is poverty which is, itself, an expression of racial inequality. The poor have no, or limited, access to proper healthcare. For the rich, this factor is of little relevance.

Moreover, poor communities tend to work in low-paying jobs in the service sector, where social distancing is nearly impossible. With little government support to help them survive the lockdowns, they do everything within their power to provide for their children, only to be infected by the virus or, worse, die.

Iniquity expected to continue
This iniquity is expected to continue even in the way that the vaccines are made available. While several Western nations have either launched or scheduled their vaccination campaigns, the poorest nations on earth are expected to wait for a long time before life-saving vaccines are made available.

In 67 poor or developing countries located mostly in Africa and the Southern hemisphere, only one out of ten individuals will likely receive the vaccine by the end of 2020, the Fortune Magazine website reported.

The disturbing report cited a study conducted by a humanitarian and rights coalition, the People’s Vaccine Alliance (PVA), which includes Oxfam and Amnesty International.

If there is such a thing as a strategy at this point, it is the deplorable “hoarding” of the vaccine by rich nations.

Dr Mohga Kamal-Yanni of the PVA put this realisation into perspective when she said that “rich countries have enough doses to vaccinate everyone nearly three times over, while poor countries don’t even have enough to reach health workers and people at risk”.

So much for the numerous conferences touting the need for a “global response” to the disease.

But it does not have to be this way.

While it is likely that class, race and gender inequalities will continue to ravage human societies after the pandemic, as they did before, it is also possible for governments to use this collective tragedy as an opportunity to bridge the inequality gap, even if just a little, as a starting point to imagine a more equitable future for all of us.

Poor, dark-skinned people should not be made to die when their lives can be saved by a simple vaccine, which is available in abundance.

Dr Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is “These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr Baroud is a non-resident senior research fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University (IZU). This article is republished with permission. His website is www.ramzybaroud.net

]]> With a mandate to govern NZ alone, Labour must now decide what it really stands for https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/10/21/with-a-mandate-to-govern-nz-alone-labour-must-now-decide-what-it-really-stands-for/ Tue, 20 Oct 2020 22:15:24 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=51743 ANALYSIS: By David Hall, Auckland University of Technology

A pandemic can change the foundations of a society. But if this happens in New Zealand over the next three years, it will be for reasons beyond the control of the sixth Labour government. When it comes to the fundamental structure of state and economy, Labour is broadly committed to the status quo.

This was confirmed on election night when Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, wearing a Labour red dress before a National blue background, declared: “We will be a party that governs for every New Zealander.”

In times of upset, people yearn for normality — and Ardern’s Labour Party was awarded a landslide for achieving something close to this. The risk of a further covid-19 outbreak is ever present, as today’s announcement of a community transmission case in Auckland reminded us.

Nevertheless, international spectators view our pandemic response with a wistful gaze. At a time when many nations went sour on liberal democracy and rolled the populist dice, New Zealand appears on the world stage like a tribute act to third-way politics, a nostalgic throwback to the relative sanity and stability of the long 1990s.

Yet for many people who live in Aotearoa New Zealand, the status quo isn’t working, and hasn’t for some time. These tensions are only intensifying.

Housing unaffordability is on the rise again, with implications for wealth inequality and deprivation. This is compounded further by the cascading economic effects of the global pandemic and unconventional manoeuvres in monetary policy that are pushing house prices higher.

Man reading a newspaper
The headline says it all: but what will Labour do with that power? Image: Getty Images/The Conversation

Without remedial action, this inequality will leave New Zealand society more exposed to future shocks, not only from covid-19, but also the multiplying risks of climate change, biodiversity collapse, digital disruption and international instability. Inequality ensures uneven impacts, a recipe for further discontent and conflict.

No party for idealogues
Even from a purely electoral perspective, the Labour Party can’t afford inaction. It is easy to forget how precarious the prime minister’s position was at the beginning of the year.

She could boast enough policy wins to stack an early campaign video, yet hadn’t pulled a fiscal lever large enough to convince the public that her government was truly “transformational”.

Entering a second term, her policy agenda is more recognisable by what she won’t do than what she will — no capital gains tax, no wealth tax, indeed no new taxes at all beyond a tweak for the highest earners.

This leaves us with the longstanding conundrum of what the Labour Party is and what it really stands for these days. Ardern and her colleagues are not ideologues, but no politics is without ideology — a system of ideas, values and beliefs that orients its efforts.

I’ve argued in the past that Ardern’s government has a spirit of civic republicanism. This has met with reasonable scepticism, yet in the midst of the pandemic it feels more relevant than ever.

With borders drastically restricted, and old allies going wayward, there is a renewed sense of separateness, of independence in the world.

Might the pandemic seal New Zealand’s fate as the Commonwealth of Oceana, as a 21st century version of 17th century English republican John Harrington’s utopian island?

Kindness as a political virtue
The first symptom of republicanism belongs to Ardern herself. She is the active citizen par excellence. She embodies civic commitment and public-spiritedness, along with a good dose of humility. Even in emergencies, she remains one of us: primus inter pares, “first among equals”.

Analysts of Ardern’s political leadership emphasise her openness, honesty, self-discipline, empathy and, above all, her authenticity. For civic republicans, the exercise of such virtues is the lifeblood of public life. Indeed, insofar as Ardern has a distinctive political agenda, it is centred on the virtue of kindness.

Arguably, this has displaced the more principled commitments that might guide substantive structural reform. But kindness also provided vital emotional leadership in the raw moments following the Christchurch mosque attacks and the outset of the pandemic.

As the 18th century philosopher Montesquieu said, “Virtue in a republic is a most simple thing: it is a love of the republic.” Few could doubt Ardern’s devotion to the nation. But for the Labour Party, as for republicans, this has an exclusionary aspect.

Given the emphasis on citizens, republicans have tended to prioritise “us” over “them”. In the Athenian republic, only citizens could participate in democracy, and only wealthy men could be citizens — not women, not slaves, not foreigners.

Similarly, in New Zealand’s “team of five million”, only citizens have the full spectrum of rights and entitlements. For more than 300,000 temporary visa holders, whose compliance with pandemic restrictions was vital for containing the outbreak, there was minimal solidarity from government.

Many were frozen out of jobs during lockdown, unable to relocate due to visa conditions, and excluded from social welfare support. Others were stuck outside the country until very recently, unable to re-enter. From a liberal or internationalist perspective, this is hard to swallow. But there is a nativist strain within the Labour Party which will relish these harder borders.

None of this is to say that Labour’s politics aren’t liberal or social democratic. Ideologies can be mixed in the same way that economies can be. It is to say, more modestly, that some of the qualities that characterise the Ardern government align with civic republicanism.

And this helps to resist the lazy analysis that this government is nothing more than a continuation of what came before, another phase in an undifferentiable centrist blob.

People wearing red clapping
Pasifika Labour Party supporters celebrate as results roll in. The challenge is now to deliver for New Zealand’s least well-off communities. Image: Getty Images/The Conversation

Neither socialist nor purely liberal
But where to next? Firstly, this is not a government of pure socialist intentions. Accusations of this kind come from a place of confusion, delusion, or plain mischief. Socialism, simply put, involves collective ownership of the means of production.

This government already relinquished an unprecedented opportunity to socialise the economy when it implemented its wage subsidy scheme at the outset of the pandemic.

Public debt is growing precisely to keep private businesses in private hands. Labour’s resistance to substantive tax reform, even to reduce the debt it insists it must pay back, reveals its abandonment of redistribution as a practicable tool for social change.

Secondly, this is not a government of purely liberal intentions. It is ambivalent about the free flow of people and capital. Attorney-General David Parker, in particular, has prioritised citizens through restrictions on overseas buyers of housing and the “national interest” test for foreign investment.

It is notable that former National prime minister Sir John Key, guided by a vision of global liberalism that is increasingly endangered, is still railing against this.

Ardern’s government is also unembarrassed about a more active role for the state. Its approach for housing is illustrative — not just its boost to state-owned housing, but especially its embrace of the state’s potential as a developer providing houses directly to market.

Liberals see this as mere interference, but republicans tolerate government intervention wherever it improves the lives of citizens. In the wake of the pandemic, voters will be prone to agree.

The danger of losing trust
This touches on the defining feature of civic republicanism: its commitment to freedom from domination. Republicans accept the kinds of intervention that liberals fear, as long as they free people from situations of oppression and subjugation.

Domination should also be broadly understood to include regulations, poverty, sexism, racism, environmental degradation, employment relations — anything that thwarts our cherished projects.

This is where the republican spirit mostly clearly intersects with the sixth Labour government’s interest in well-being. The purpose of worrying about well-being is to improve people’s capabilities to live the kinds of lives they most value.

Because the aforementioned forms of oppression curtail such freedoms, we have a duty to overturn them, through intervention if necessary. Well-being economics isn’t merely about measurement; it is an emancipatory project.

Ardern’s government is most vulnerable to criticism when it falls short of this ideal — for example, the oppressive practices of Oranga Tamariki or ineffective infrastructure development. If voters won’t punish Ardern for not being socialist or liberal enough, they might still penalise her for failing to make real these republican impulses.

It is said that, in politics, what lifts you up is what will eventually drag you down. When the virtues of openness fail to strengthen transparency, when state intervention fails to deliver outcomes competently or effectively, when appeals to “the people” paper over vital differences, when the politics of kindness fail to prevent suffering — this is where trust will be lost.

The danger of electoral dominance is becoming your own worst enemy.The Conversation

Dr David Hall is senior researcher in politics at Auckland University of Technology. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

]]> Greens sweep 10 seats in huge NZ win for climate crisis, social justice action https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/10/18/greens-sweep-10-seats-in-huge-nz-win-for-climate-crisis-social-justice-action/ Sun, 18 Oct 2020 05:00:49 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=51637 By RNZ News

The Green Party say voters have given a strong signal they are valued in the New Zealand government, and they have ambitions for executive roles in the next one.

With special votes still to be counted in yesterday’s general election, the party has 180,224 votes or 7.6 percent of votes nationally, which wins them nine list MPs as well as the hotly contested third place for party vote share.

It is a spot that is typically a scramble between the smaller parties, and can bestow the possibility of negotiating a key place in a coalition government.

NZ ELECTIONS 2020 – 17 October

However Labour’s sweeping victory with 64 seats gives the party enough seats to govern alone.

Green co-leader Marama Davidson told RNZ’s Guyon Espiner she is very happy with the outcome, which should give them 10 MPs.

In 2017 the party got 6.2 percent of the party vote.

Electorate win in Auckland Central
This year’s one electorate win was for Chlöe Swarbrick, number three on the party’s list, who polled better on election day than polls had showed in the lead-up, and won the Auckland Central seat off the opposition National Party.

She beat Labour’s Helen White by 492 votes, however Labour won that electorate’s party vote. The only other Green Party member to have ever held an electorate seat was Jeanette Fitzsimons, for Coromandel in 1999.

Swarbrick’s win means another Green candidate from further down the list is headed for Parliament.

“I’m really ecstatic, completely stoked. We were hoping to stay above five percent, because historically smaller first term government parties do not achieve that,” Davidson says.

“Not only have we defied the results… but we’ve increased our support to 10 MPs. [We have] three new incredible MPs, I’m completely ecstatic.”

The party’s list number eight is Teanau Tuiono (Palmerston North), who Davidson says will be their first Pasifika MP.

Number nine is LGBTQI and Māori activist Elizabeth Kerekere (Ikaroa-Rāwhiti); and anti-poverty campaigner Ricardo Menéndez March (Maungakiekie) is the number 10.

Special votes crucial
Davidson said special votes would show whether they could boost their number to 11, as well.

She said the party would meet together today to discuss what they wanted next; whether they wanted to negotiate with Labour to try to form a coalition government again, what the crucial factors are that they wanted on the table, and what would be the deal-breakers for them.

Davidson said that despite the strength of Labour’s position, she believed New Zealanders would still prefer a coalition.

“People do not want to see just one political party in full power,” she said.

“They totally gave huge [numbers] to Labour, that’s clear, but I think it’s been clear in the polls and the surveys done right up to the election, and the fact Greens swung an extra 2 percent on top of what we were polling – it’s again a clear mandate for not just one party to hold all the reigns of power.”

Davidson said they did not yet have any appointment set up to meet with Labour, and today the Greens would hold internal discussions about what their next steps might be.

“I am being upfront with our strategy here: [talk of a coalition] will absolutely come back to the members, on how well we can see our long term future going into the next term; whether or not we are able to achieve our work programme, our priorities in climate, inequality and environment.

Roles to progress Greens programme
“Whether or not we achieve roles that can progress that work programme. That is what… agreement will come down to for our members. And we won’t be able to pre-empt that for our members.”

In the outgoing government New Zealand First won 7.2 percent of the party vote, but crucially that gave them the ability to swing the balance of power between a right or left -leaning government. They played that position into gaining the deputy Prime Minister role for party leader Winston Peters, three positions in cabinet, an outside cabinet a ministerial and an under-secretary role.

By contrast, the Greens came away poorer: three ministerial positions (including Minister for Climate Change, Minister for Women and Minister of Conservation), and an under-secretary role, but all outside of cabinet.

“Outside of the executive in the last term, the Greens in Government achieved more action for climate change than 30 years,” Davidson said.

But this time around, can they hope for Labour to consider their MPs for ministerial roles or cabinet positions?

“We would want to see roles that would progress [our work] programme, and yes, it would involve some ministerial responsibility at that level,” she said.

“Across all of our MPs, we will be looking at aligning potential roles with the work programme, as a whole not just down to one person.”

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

Chlöe Swarbrick wins Auckland Central. Video: RNZ

]]> Ziena Jalil: Why ticking the diversity boxes keeps missing the mark https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/09/23/ziena-jalil-why-ticking-the-diversity-boxes-keeps-missing-the-mark/ Tue, 22 Sep 2020 22:02:50 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=50875 COMMENT: By Ziena Jalil

Diversity was in the spotlight last week. Te Wiki o te Reo Māori and Te Wā Tuku Reo Māori were embraced throughout organisations and homes. We also had the annual Diversity Awards NZ celebrating the organisations championing diversity and inclusion in workplaces.

Tellingly, most award recipients talked about ensuring our workplaces are representative of our society.

Having diversity at the table is an excellent and important start, but just as with Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, if our engagement ends there, we lose the full potential diversity and inclusion offer.

Research shows that diverse teams are more creative, innovative, resilient and empathetic. They are more productive and profitable. Shareholders and customers are starting to vote with their wallets too – requiring organisations to embrace diversity and inclusion.

Across New Zealand, our organisations are becoming more diverse due to changing demographics. The latest census data shows almost 40 percent of Kiwis identify as Māori, Pacific or Asian; and more than 55 percent in Auckland.

More than half of us identify as female, a quarter of us weren’t born here, and a quarter have disabilities. We also have an aging population.

But diversity without inclusion is meaningless.

Typical approach
The typical approach to diversity is to record the number of people in each diversity box, including: gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, physical ability, age, beliefs, socio-economic background, and education.

And we are seeing more and more organisations reporting in this way.

In many of my roles throughout my career, I have been the youngest, the only ethnic Indian, and migrant from the Pacific, a religious minority, and one of few women. That’s a few boxes I tick.

And yet I have been told that had I identified with the rainbow community and had a disability, I would be a better poster child for diversity.

We are in such a hurry to put people in boxes, we miss the intersectionality that arises as a result of the multiple forms of diversity they represent. We also fail to see that people have the potential to bring a lot more to the table than ticks in boxes.

A few years ago, a high-achieving Māori woman recalled to me her early experiences on boards. One of her board chairs would seek input from the males at the table and ignore her.

The reporting metrics would have shown a Māori woman on that board, but her knowledge, skills and experience were underutilised.

Tick box exercises
Sadly, such tick box exercises are still prevalent today. If anything, perhaps even more so as appointment panels are under more pressure now to ensure teams are diverse.

A tick box approach to diversity and inclusion also perpetuates stereotypes. By having a token Māori, or Pacific or Asian person at the table, we expect them to represent the views of entire communities. This ignores the huge diversity within Pacific and Asian communities.

We also forget that while we may identify with an ethnicity and its cultural values, our education, socio-economic background, life and work experiences all mean that our views are not going to be representative of everyone in our community. The same applies for people who identify with disabilities or gender minorities.

Just as we need all of us for diversity to exist, the responsibility for harnessing the value of diversity and inclusion lies with all of us too – not only those who are considered diverse, which is often minorities. While it is important leaders set the tone, the onus is on each of us to learn about those different from ourselves – whatever dimension that difference may take.

Step in someone else’s shoes for a day. Covid-19 and the lockdowns magnified some of these differences. Consider that 90 percent of the newly unemployed as a result of covid-19 have been women.

Consider that Māori and Pacific people are more likely to end up in unemployment statistics than other communities.

Consider older colleagues unable to work because they were vulnerable or immunocompromised. Contrast those worried about how to put food on the table with those who complained about missing their regular coffee fix.

Business claims
Many businesses claim they seek to maximise diversity, but their systems promote similarity. Recruiting practices emphasise hiring from historically reliable sources.

Job ads give cues which help attract or turn off certain candidates. Selection practices often tend to choose candidates based on what’s worked in the past.

Within an organisation, dominant cultures tend to subsume all others. This is also reflected in approaches to performance and pay reviews, and promotions, which mean minorities and women continue to stagnate and plateau.

Diversity and inclusion cannot be a one-off exercise. Organisations need strong, sustained and inclusive leadership and culture. A culture where all people feel respected and valued, and not viewed as ticks in a box.

Ziena Jalil is an independent director, strategic consultant, and diversity and inclusion advocate. This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre with the author’s permission and was originally published by Stuff.

]]> Bryan Bruce: The fog of economic policy is starting to clear https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/09/20/bryan-bruce-the-fog-of-economic-policy-is-starting-to-clear/ Sun, 20 Sep 2020 03:30:33 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=50770 ANALYSIS: By Bryan Bruce

National’s economic policy of temporary tax cuts for next month’s New Zealand general election yesterday proved – if proof be needed – that they are unapologetic neoliberals.

While their claim that with more money in their pockets people will spend more might sound attractive, the reality is that tax cuts always benefit the wealthy and make the lives of folk on lower incomes worse.

Why?

READ MORE: Other Bryan Bruce columns on Asia Pacific Report

NZ ELECTIONS 2020 – 17 October

Because we know from bitter experience that neoliberal trickle-down theory widens the gap between the rich and the poor and even the most cursory look at National’s tax cuts announcement confirms that a vote for them is a vote for the ME society, not the WE society (especially if they hold political hands with ACT to form the next government).

For example, under National’s scheme if you were to earn between $20,000 and $40,000 a year you would receive roughly an extra $8 a week, while if you were to earn $90,000 and over you would have $58 more in your pocket.

We know that people on low incomes spend every dollar they have just to get by, whereas wealthier people don’t. So high income earners who receive extra money can invest it in things that increase their personal wealth but don’t necessarily contribute to the public good.

Logic also tells you that the less money a government collects the less it has to spend. This means that under National there would be cut backs in vital services like Health and Education – the very things that the rich can already buy but the poor desperately need to stay well in the covid-19 economy and also improve their lot in life.

If Labour were brave
If Labour were brave they would turn this National tax policy on its head with a progressive tax that raised the level for those on incomes over $90,000 and lowered the rate for Kiwis on low incomes, because THAT would be a move in the direction on Well-being and the WE society.

That said, I do think that Labour’s approach of more state involvement in the marketplace, which proved so effective in getting us out of the Great Depression, is a far better way of fixing a broken economy.

The government can create money because it has its own bank. It can also borrow money at very, very low interest rates and pass that benefit on to its citizens in many ways – such as cheaper housing.

Economic policy statements by the Greens such as “People with the least ability to pay tax should pay the least as a proportion of their income, while those who can pay more should do so to contribute to the welfare of society” suggest they want to close the gap between the rich and the poor.

But while their full economic policy certainly contains lot of feel good factors in it, I would really like to see some specifics from them. For example – How much would each income tranche pay in progressive tax and other taxes under a Green-led government? (Since writing this, however, I am now reliably informed the detail is on Page 21 para 12.2 of their policy! This really needs to be upfront info).

NZ First Economic policy ??… umm.. well when I Googled it I found a couple of news items where party leader Winston Peter’s made statements back in March to the effect that there would be no personal or company tax increases and a No to such things as a Capital Gains tax .

Coalition agreement reference
Their approach, as best as I can garner it from news items, would, in my view, put them closer to National’s economic philosophy – ie. that private businesses, more than state intervention in the market place, is the way to deal with the economic crisis we are facing: Their ideas of special tax concessions for certain business start-ups in rural and regional New Zealand, an Instant Asset Write-Off Scheme – allowing small businesses with turnover less than $1 million to claim immediate deductions for new or second-hand plant and equipment purchases such as vehicles, tools and office equipment up to a combined value of $3000 annually and so on.

However if you go to NZ First’s website and click on “policy” you get a reference to the coalition agreement. Nothing is immediately clear and I shouldn’t have to hunt for a party’s economic policy.

If you are looking for a completely different approach to running our economy there are the Social Credit Party and The Opportunities Party, both of which advocate state intervention in the economy.

Social Credit’s website, for example, promotes the idea of using the Reserve Bank to create money rather than the current system where the commercial banks are basically given a licence to do it.

They would get rid of GST and replace it with a Financial Transaction Tax . They want a maximum payment of $20 for all GP and dentist visits, no tax on the first $20,000 of income, no fares on all urban public transport, a “Child Dividend’ of $30 per week for all children under 18, a guaranteed minimum income for all low income earners, a rent-to-own public housing programme an grants for relocation to lower cost parts of the country

The Opportunities Party on the other hand is promoting such things as a Universal Basic Income of $250 a week for everyone no questions asked, the introduction of a property tax, taxing houses the same as other assets and a tax on sugar and junk foods.

Does this help clear the fog of choice in the up coming election for you a bit …or not?

Over to you.

Bryan Bruce is an independent filmmaker and journalist. The Pacific Media Centre is publishing a series of occasional commentaries by him during the NZ election campaign.

]]> Bryan Bruce: Unemployment isn’t working – we need universal job creation https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/08/20/bryan-bruce-unemployment-isnt-working-we-need-universal-job-creation/ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/08/20/bryan-bruce-unemployment-isnt-working-we-need-universal-job-creation/#comments Wed, 19 Aug 2020 23:17:44 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=49680 COMMENTARY: By Bryan Bruce

I live in Auckland. Last night while driving home around 8pm I passed a small roadside car park with about 10 vehicles in it with people sleeping in them. I doubt they were holiday makers.

A story on today’s RNZ news feed says there are now 29 registered food banks serving the city.

On the news I caught an item about students leaving school early to try and bring some income into the house or look after younger siblings so their parents can work.

NZ ELECTIONS 2020 – 17 October

I’m sure these issues are not just Auckland problems but are being faced by many communities throughout our country.

Times are going to get tougher before they get better, so what can we do about it?

One solution on offer is the UBI – the universal basic income. I understand the arguments but I am not yet convinced about it. My concern is less about cost than about creating incentive and dignity.

Most people, given the chance, I believe, would rather earn the money to put food on the table than be given handouts.

Great Depression strategy
If we look back to the Great Depression, the strategy that delivered an economic recovery was government-created jobs, particularly through big infrastructure projects such as building schools and houses, improving the railways and tree planting.

It’s what I would call universal job creation (UJC) which would require the government to become far more active in the marketplace.

How would it be initially funded? By doing that thing NZ governments to date have been frightened of doing – run the budget deficit until the economic ship comes right.

Why would you do that?

Because one person’s spending is another person’s income and you can’t spend if you have no income.

By the government creating jobs it stimulates the economy in a way that is more positive for our society than handouts because long term things get made.

I’d also take this crisis moment to redefine what we mean by a “job”.

Neoliberal model failure
For far too long we have accepted the neoliberal model which insists that, for example, mothers put their children in care while they get a job to earn money.

It could well be part of a universal job creation scheme that bringing up children or caring for a disabled or perhaps elderly relatives is considered a “job” for which people are paid a living wage.

There could be work making community food gardens, paying people to develop free computer software or to be musicians and artists for example.

Before I sign off for today I should just mention that the National Party posters I see around my neighbourhood do feature the word “jobs” but the what they propose to do is neoliberal.

Give tax breaks to the well off and it will trickle down to creating lowly paid jobs for the not-so-well-off.

The post-covid economy is going to be very different. The marketplace will not fix our increasing poverty issue. Deficit funding of jobs, the Great Depression taught us, certainly would.

An Australian economist who has written quite a bit about government job creation is Bill Mitchell and you can find a useful article about him and his job guarantee idea here.

Bryan Bruce is an independent filmmaker and journalist. The Pacific Media Centre is publishing a series of occasional commentaries by him during the NZ election campaign.

]]> https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/08/20/bryan-bruce-unemployment-isnt-working-we-need-universal-job-creation/feed/ 1 Teuila Fuatai: Vitriol harms Pasifika as much as the covid pandemic https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/08/19/teuila-fuatai-vitriol-harms-pasifika-as-much-as-the-covid-pandemic/ Wed, 19 Aug 2020 00:23:35 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=49630 COMMENT: By Teuila Fuatai

South Auckland and its communities, specifically Pasifika, are at the centre of New Zealand’s current covid-19 cluster.

As a result, media coverage, health information and public reaction have taken a significantly different tone to what occurred during New Zealand’s first wave of cases.

Racism and misinformation continue to marginalise the “index” family, Pasifika communities and South Auckland. It is an ugliness that has fed debate around the merits of continually highlighting ethnicity and the region.

Questions include the need for the public to know cases are “Pasifika”, and whether they are being treated fairly by health authorities. That then links to the recent requirement for virus-positive households to go into managed facilities.

The answers to those do not come neatly packaged. However, they are important when trying to understand information, including ethnicity data, around the current outbreak. Part of that includes looking at the timing of information being released.

A ‘Pasifika’ family
The current cluster, and subsequent restrictions, were announced a week ago by the Prime Minister and Director-General of Health. At the 9.15pm press conference, Dr Ashley Bloomfield identified the family as being from South Auckland with workplaces in other parts of the city.

According to his timeline, that was about six hours after health officials were alerted to the positive covid-19 tests. Dr Bloomfield and Jacinda Ardern declined to give further detail that night, citing privacy reasons and early stages of contact tracing.

However, less than 12 hours later, the family was identified in the media as Pasifika.

While that information was bound to become public anyway, Pasifika public health experts wanted more time, and evidence of spread via contact tracing before identifying the family as Pasifika.

That was supported by Dr Bloomfield. Dr Api Talemaitoga, a GP in South Auckland who is also part of the Health Ministry’s Pasifika Covid-19 response team, said at that early stage of contract tracing, there was no evidence to show identification of the family as “Pasifika” would be useful.

“It was a supposed outbreak, but nobody knew how large it was,” Dr Talemaitoga said about the first 24 hours.

“We wanted more time to get that information before talking about ethnicity because we were worried about how the family, and even the community at large would be stigmatised.”

And that’s exactly what happened, he added.

Slightly different take
Dr Collin Tukuitonga, Associate Dean (Pacific) and Associate Professor of Public Health at the University of Auckland, had a slightly different take on it.

While “on balance”, more time should have been allowed for contact tracing before the family was identified as Pasifika, he stressed it was “not a clean event”.

“It’s hard to know because when you identify them as Pasifika, the usual nastiness comes out and… racism rears its ugly head,” he explained.

“But you have to balance that across the public’s need to know. If you were just simply contact tracing a small group of people within a limited area, then you could argue you don’t need to identify the ethnicity.

“The problem with this is we already knew the wife worked in Mt Eden, and the husband worked in Mt Wellington, and that company had three sites linked to the airport.

“The GP was also out in Glen Eden, and the child went to Mt Albert Primary.”

Positive families in managed facilities
Dr Bloomfield’s decision to move covid-positive families into managed isolation facilities has been criticised as racist. It was not a policy during the last outbreak, when the majority of cases were Pālagi New Zealanders, aged 30 to 50, returning from overseas.

Notably, both Dr Talemaitoga and Dr Tukuitonga believe this is the best accommodation response. Their evidence: hard lessons from the Marist cluster during the last outbreak. A number of Pasifika families were part of that cluster.

Dr Talemaitoga: “There were families where somebody tested positive and then they isolated themselves. The others in the house were asymptomatic, but say seven days later, someone was found to be positive, and then two weeks later, another person got [a positive test].”

“Some families ended up being in isolation for up to four weeks or more… and that’s really disruptive,” he said.

Pertinent to this is the set-up of many Pasifika households. Families are more likely to live in overcrowded homes compared to Pālagi (about 40 percent of Pasifika households). That makes it more difficult to isolate covid-19 positive individuals effectively. The managed facilities provide a good alternative, he said.

Dr Tukuitonga added he believed the previous approach allowing positive cases to isolate at home was an unnecessary risk.

“From a public health point of view, I thought it was quite lax. That fact that we’re requiring everyone into quarantine is the right thing to do if we want to get on top of the current cases.”

Pasifika-specific stats
On Sunday, Dr Bloomfield announced the number of Pasifika cases for the current cluster would be provided separately.

In the first wave, Pasifika accounted for about 5 percent of cases. In this current cluster, about 75 per cent of positive cases are Pasifika. This data is needed to accurately target resources, culturally specific information, and wider support services in communities.

It is not about assigning blame, Dr Talemaitoga said.

Dr Tukuitonga touched on testing rates as an example.

“One thing we’re struggling with at the moment is testing. If we get the picture that 70 percent of all cases in the new cluster is Pacific, and they say… the Pacific testing is only 10 percent of the total testing, then we can say ‘That’s not good enough’.

“From our point of view, at the very least, our testing rates should be at least 70 percent [so it’s comparable to case numbers],” he said.

“Instead of guessing, it means we have information to make our case more intelligently.”

So far, there’s been a torrent of misinformation and vitriol directed at victims of covid-19. It has been particularly tough for Pasifika.

As Dr Talemaitoga and Dr Tukuitonga have shown, one of the best ways to combat that is by understanding how decisions are made about our health and communities.

Teuila Fuatai is a freelance journalist specialising in social and cultural issues. This article was first published in The New Zealand Herald and is republished here with the author’s permission.

Covid-19 in NZ 180820
Covid-19 cases in New Zealand on 18 August 2020. Graphic: NZH
Covid-19 daily cases in New Zealand. Graphic: NZH
]]> Fiji government urged to reconsider NZ$5.3 million office for PM https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/08/19/fiji-government-urged-to-reconsider-nz5-3-million-office-for-pm/ Tue, 18 Aug 2020 22:14:14 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=49609 By RNZ Pacific

Plans for spending NZ$5.3 on construction of the Fiji Prime Minister’s new office should be diverted to people affected by the covid-19 coronavirus pandemic, civil society groups say.

The groups, which form the Civil Society Organisation Alliance for Covid-19 Humanitarian Response, said requests they had received for assistance from families prompted them to urge the government to reconsider the construction.

Director of the Social Empowerment and Education Programme (SEEP) Chantelle Khan said children needed to be cared for during the crisis.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – World ‘nowhere close’ to needed herd immunity, says WHO

“The F$7.4m (NZ$5.3m) that’s supposed to go to the PM’s Office – give all of it to the future generation of this country and to our elderly. Our Social Welfare recipients and our children who need to be fed,” she said.

Khan also called for the government to work with stakeholders for the betterment of the country. This would reflect a democratic government that cared for its people, she said.

“We need to work together, so please relocate this funding to children who are unable to be fed by their families because of the impact of this pandemic.”

The alliance includes the Women’s Rights Movement (FWRM), the Social Education Empowerment Programme (SEEP), the Foundation for Rural Integrated

Enterprises and Development (FRIEND), the Women’s Crisis Centre, FemLink Pacific and the Citizens Constitutional Forum (CCF).

Shamima Ali of the Women’s Crisis Centre said Fiji was not “out of the woods yet” and that there was a dire need in community for the money devoted to the office.

Humanitarian centre opens
People in the Western Division whose lives have been affected by the pandemic can now access basic assistance from the Alliance’s Humanitarian Response Centre in Navakai, Nadi.

Opposition MP Lenora Qereqeretabua at the new centre in Nadi.
Opposition MP Lenora Qereqeretabua at the new centre in Nadi. Image: RNZ/NFP/Facebook

The centre opened last week and is the brainchild of Fiji’s largest NGO, Then India Sanmarga Ikya Sangam (TISI Sangam), to establish a one-stop shop in the west that provides school lunches for children.

TISI Sangam president Sadasivan Naicker said the centre was timely because it would assist Fijians who had lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic.

“We have branches all over Fiji and with the manpower we have, we can help in this programme to make it successful,” Naicker told The Fiji Times.

“We are in a better position and this is the first time we have forged such a partnership with the NGOs and we look forward to this.”

The Foundation for Rural Integrated Enterprises and Development (FRIEND) said there was a need to establish the centre because it would make work easier for people who needed assistance.

FRIEND director Sashi Kiran said in recent months, more than 40 percent of its food bank applicants were from Nadi.

Kiran said they were mostly people who had no employment as a result of the pandemic.

The centre will also distribute seedlings, facilitate training, and provide counselling and legal services.

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

]]> Has the new world order failed? UN calls for new global deal https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/07/20/has-the-new-world-order-failed-un-calls-for-new-global-deal/ Sun, 19 Jul 2020 20:04:18 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=48488 Not everyone is in the same boat! Video: Al Jazeera

Pacific Media Centre Newsdesk

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres argues that inequality starts at the top and has called for a new global deal.

Not everyone is in the same boat. The 26 richest people in the world hold as much wealth as half its population, reports Al Jazeera’s Inside Story.

Life chances depend on gender, race and whether a person has a disability. These global inequalities are being made worse by the coronavirus pandemic, and the world is reaching its “breaking point”.

That is the bleak reality laid bare by Guterres, who delivered one of his most hard-hitting messages on Saturday.

He said disparities start with the biggest institutions and they should be eradicated under a new model of global governance that guarantees a fair share of wealth, opportunity and power.

But how is that possible? And does the pandemic offer a chance for change?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan
Guests:
Max Lawson – head of inequality policy at Oxfam
Jayati Ghosh – international development economist and professor
Alexander Deane – former chief of staff to ex-UK Prime Minister David Cameron

]]> Bryan Bruce: Economics and the NZ election – unpacking neoliberal agendas https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/07/17/bryan-bruce-economics-and-the-nz-election-unpacking-neoliberal-agendas/ Fri, 17 Jul 2020 08:52:02 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=48431 ANALYSIS: By Bryan Bruce in the first of a series

What is the purpose of an economy?

I realised this morning that it is 7 years since I made my documentary Mind The Gap in which I unpacked the socially disastrous consequences of the neoliberal economic agenda, introduced by the 4th Labour government led by David Lange and Finance Minister Roger Douglas, 36 years ago.

It allowed (and continues to allow) a few of us to get rich at the expense of the many and for a huge gap to open up in our country between the haves and the have nots.

READ MORE: Opposition National leader Judith Collins announces infrastructure plan

One of the questions I asked of every economist I encountered at that time was: “What is the purpose of an economy?”

I remember one of them (a New Zealander as it happened) getting angry at me over the phone.

“That’s a stupid question! “ he barked. “That’s like asking ‘What’s the purpose of a tree!”

“No” I said. “A tree is something created by nature. An economy is something created by humans. In that sense it is more like asking, ‘What is the purpose of a hammer?’ Which we can describe as a tool for bashing in nails or beating metal.”

That’s my job
So I repeated my question because .. well, that’s my job – to ask inconvenient questions .

“We all contribute to making this thing we call ‘an economy’ – what’s its purpose?”

It was shortly after that he hung up.

The post-covid economy is going to be very tough on a lot of us and as we head towards the election on September 19 I’m going to be giving you my take on the economic policies of each of the political parties who want to rule over us for the rest of this decade.

So let me put my cards on the table.

A moral question
As I said at the end of Mind The Gap seven years ago, to ask the question “What is the purpose of an economy?” is to ask a moral question.

Is it so that a few people can get extremely wealthy at the expense of the many?

My answer is No.

I think the purpose of an economy is to deliver the greatest good to the largest number of our citizens over the longest period of time.

And it is from that perspective that I will be offering you my thoughts , in the coming days, on the economic policies on offer at the upcoming election.

In the meantime if you would like to watch Mind The Gap again or for the first time – here it is:

Bryan Bruce is an independent New Zealand journalist and documentary maker. This column is republished from Bryan Bruce’s Facebook page with permission.

]]> Bryan Bruce: Judith Collins selection last throw of the dice to save the Right https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/07/15/bryan-bruce-judith-collins-selection-last-throw-of-the-dice-to-save-the-right/ Wed, 15 Jul 2020 03:26:05 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=48356 ANALYSIS: By Bryan Bruce

The selection of Judith Collins by her colleagues as the new leader of New Zealand’s opposition National Party is a last minute throw of the political dice that might just save the Right from splintering at the upcoming election.

One of the problems of the political Left over the last 30 or so years is that it has been fragmented with voters under MMP choosing between Labour, Greens, TOP and Maori Party to name a few, along with NZ First as a centrist party. Whereas the Right has, until now, been solidly National with a much smaller ACT party.

The resignation of Todd Muller yesterday may see a number of traditional National Party voters move to ACT this election, but the selection of Judith Collins as leader will certainly do much stem that flow.

READ MORE: ‘Common goal – oust government’, says NZ’s new National leader Collins

While Judith Collins is a person with very different political views to my own I have to say she is a skilled politician and front-footed last night’s press conference in a way that immediately confirmed Muller’s own assessment of himself that he was not the right person for the job.

For me however there was one particularly revealing economic policy moment when she was posed a rare and intelligent and searching question very late in the gathering.

“What would be your general approach over the next three years?” the unseen journalist asked.

“ Would you borrow more? Would you cut the spending would you raise taxation. Would you try to pay the debt back or would you leave it to roll down through the generations?”

Tension-relieving joke
To which she responded with a tension-relieving joke before saying:

“It’s pretty obvious that the National Party is not the party of big taxes . We are the party of sensible spending, we’re a party of infrastructure, we’re a party that believes in investing. We’re not stupid with money because we always know that somebody has to pay it back and the last thing that we want is to leave a legacy for the next two generations to pay back on.

“These are the sorts of views that we are taking into this [election] and that’s where we are always better than the other people because we know that we have to pay it back.”

I’ll have more to say about the economic policies of all the political parties in the coming days but for now I offer just a quick reaction.

That statement by National’s new leader reflects a pre-covid mentality. It reveals a mindset that pretends the economic world has not dramatically changed, that we are not facing a major recession which may become a deep depression.

Why?

Because during the Great Depression years of the 1930s leaders like Franklin D Roosevelt and our own Michael Joseph Savage understood that in such times government spending is what saves an economy, not penny pinching or leaving it to business to decide .

New post-covid rules
The new rules of the post-covid economy are only just forming. The longer the pandemic runs the deeper our economic problems will become.

Yesterday’s thinking which pandered to the vested interests of the few at the expense of the many isn’t going to cut it .

As for “leaving a legacy of debt “for the next generations and being” a party of infrastructure” – I invite you to reflect on how our schools and hospitals were run down under the last National administration and how, in the 1990s, National Finance Minister Ruth Richardson cut the benefits – with the result that all the diseases of poverty which affect poor children the most all skyrocketed.

So in my view, last night the economic gauntlet has been thrown down .

Labour, Greens and all the others now have to pick it up and clearly state why their handling of our economy will be different from the continued neoliberal approach to running it that Judith Collins re-articulated last night.

Bryan Bruce is an independent New Zealand journalist and documentary maker with a progressive view on politics and economics. This commentary was first published on Facebook and has been republished here with permission.

]]> The National: Let’s play our part to end gender violence in PNG https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/07/04/the-national-lets-play-our-part-to-end-violence/ Sat, 04 Jul 2020 00:29:08 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=48012 The National editorial

Hundreds walked the Sir John Guise drive on Thursday calling for justice for the brutal death of 19-year-old mother-of-two – Jenelyn Kennedy last week.

Jenelyn’s battered lifeless body was taken into the Port Moresby General Hospital last Tuesday by four men (one believed to be the father of her two children).

Dr Sam Yockopua, the country’s chief of emergency, took to social media his outburst on what he described as “an inhumane act and work of the devil” after seeing her body.

READ MORE: Background and reports on gender-based violence in PNG

The National logo
THE NATIONAL

The media went to town with her story the next day and the Friday photograph of her battered body by The National (with permission from her family), we believe is the turning point of enough is enough.

We defied media ethics by publishing that photograph but it had to be done to drive home the message of violence is rampant in our society.

Her story needed to be told.

Though she is not around to tell it, her voice needed to be heard and that picture was used to ensure her voice was loud and clear and to also awaken the authorities and the country to the realities of gender-based violence (GBV).

Due to feelings of isolation, fear, and intimidation, many people do not speak up if they are being abused at home.

They live in fear, and therefore do not get the help that they need to get out of their current situation.

The brutality of her death has shaken the country and has not put authorities on the spot with their lack of pro-activeness in getting the GBV system working efficiently. Her story, we believe, will give victims some hope of reaching out for help and one day to speak about it.

It was a wakeup call for citizens to realise the horrific realities of GBV so they can check on their daughters, sisters or friends and help them get out before it’s too late, and so much more.

The march yesterday, with the many who wore black around the country and the evening vigil is a sign of togetherness to denounce violence against woman and to shine the light on the help system for victims.

A banner portrait showed Jenelyn’s smiling face.

The National 030720
The National’s weekend edition front page. Image: PMC screenshot

Placards bearing her name and other victims, and slogans to ending violence were displayed.

Far too often, GBV cases covered by the media gradually gets swept away.

Domestic violence does not discriminate. It exists in households of every socio-economic status, and every ethnic and cultural background.

It is often used as a weapon of control and intimidation by a partner, spouse or ex-spouse.

Her death sparked public outcry – justice for her and all victims and to put an end to violence. It shone a light on the failing GBV help system. Institutions are now responding.

Strengths and gaps within the current system are now being identified and we hope those responsible will do what is needed to improve and correct it as we move forward.

All concerned stakeholders have the responsibility now holding each other accountable so we are on the right track.

The PNG National Strategy to Prevent and Response to Gender Based Violence 2016-2025 is there. Let us move forward on a strong course of action that protects and supports victims of domestic violence.

The bottom line is we want to put a stop to domestic violence – before it ever begins.
Everyone – government, police, lawyers, social services, health-care professionals and other community partners – has a role here.

It is our collective responsibility to stop the violence.

This National editorial was published in the weekend edition, 3-5 July 2020, under the original title of “Let’s play our part to end violence”.

]]> Many in black rally for Jenelyn and against PNG gender-based violence https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/07/03/many-in-black-rally-for-jenelyn-and-against-png-gender-based-violence/ Thu, 02 Jul 2020 22:16:18 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=47947 Athletes from the Papua New Guinea’s national team joined the peaceful “cry for justice” march in the nation’s capital of Port Moresby. Video: EMTV News

By EMTV News

Many wore black yesterday in rallies against gender-based violence in Papua New Guinea in a day chosen to remember the young mother Jenelyn Kennedy – and for her death not to be in vain.

As demands grow for justice to be served and for stronger laws to be introduced, the national athletics team was among those who joined the “Walk for Jenelyn” yesterday afternoon from Parliament to the Sir John Guise Stadium, followed by a “shine the light” vigil.

The “Black Day for Jenelyn” call following Jenelyn Kennedy’s death has gained momentum, thanks to social media as word spread quickly and many working class people turned up to support the march.

READ MORE: Dame Meg Taylor’s message to PNG and other gender-based violence reports

The march was also livestreamed on social media by EMTV News.

Photos posted on social media came from different parts of the country, from Mendi in the Southern Highlands to Kiunga in the Western Province.

The march was an initiative by the PNG Men Up, a group comprising like-minded elite PNG men who want an end to violence by working alongside existing groups to drive this change.

The family of 19-year-old mother of two Jenelyn Kennedy, who died last week after allegedly being beaten for more than five days, also joined the walk.

Forum on better laws
Police commissioner David Manning earlier this week revealed plans to call for a forum after investigations are completed to looks at ways to strengthen existing laws, ensure police are more responsive and to push for the state to provide long term support systems for victims of family and sexual violence.

Madang GBV protest
Madang GBV protesters marking the Black Day for Jenelyn yesterday. Image: EMTV News

The NGO Development Council called for justice and an end to violence and also highlighted system failures that lead to breeding of family and sexual violence.

It condemned a system that allowed underage marriage and failures in the law, justice and health sectors to recognise the risks.

NDC has called on the police, health sector agencies, medical profession and other law and justice system partners to work together to change these deadly system failures.

‘Fake news’ claim
The office of the police minister released a statement dismissing a post on Facebook page PNG Daily claiming the minister as author of a misleading statement as “fake news”.

PNG Daily published a story using Police Minister Bryan Kramer’s name as the author and headlined it “Kaiwi just returned from overseas, must be quarantined for 14 days”.

Kaiwi has been charged with wilful murder over the murder of his partner Jenelyn Kennedy.

Kramer said he had taken note of a number of posts on social media questioning why Bhosip Kaiwi was not remanded at Bomana on Tuesday, reports EMTV News.

“When tagged on the question, I commented that I can only assume it’s because he has to go through a 14-day quarantine before being admitted into the general population,” Kramer said.

“I also explained that had he contracted covid-19 and enters the prison system and it spreads infecting the prisoners, then the government would be forced to start releasing prisoners, which is exactly what happened overseas.

“Right now, we don’t know who has covid-19 and who doesn’t. Some people have symptoms and get tested, and some don’t show any symptoms.”

Kramer said he had been advised by National Capital District (NCD) metropolitan superintendent Perou N’Dranou that Kaiwi was not transferred to Bomana on Tuesday because the remand warrant was received late and that prisoners cannot be transferred after 4pm.

The minister added that his comments were made based on recorded covid-19 cases overseas in countries like USA, UK and Brazil where governments were releasing prisoners to avoid spreading the coronavirus.

Port Moresby GBV protesters
Portb Moresby GBV protesters marking the Black Day for Jenelyn yesterday. Image: EMTV News

Accused Kaiwi moved to Bomana
The National reports that Kaiwi was moved to the isolation centre at Bomana prison on Wednesday where he would be remanded.

Rebecca Kuku reports that Police Commissioner David Manning said the Correctional Services department had strict covid-19 quarantine protocols for new admissions such as Kaiwi.

“I am advised by Correction Service (CS) Commissioner Stephen Pokanis that detainees admitted to the Bomana prison will be isolated at its designated isolation centre for 14 days, prior to being released to the general prison facility,” he said.

He said the risk [of covid-19] was high in prison and warders were working with police and health officials to manage it as any spread in prison would be disastrous.

Bosip Kaiwi at Bomana
Bosip Kaiwi, the man charged with murder of his partner Jenelyn Kennedy, has been transferred to Bomana prison on remand. Image: The National

The Pacific Media Centre has a partnership with EMTV News.

]]> Bryan Bruce: Why I have run out of words – and hope amid the chaos https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/06/09/bryan-bruce-why-i-have-run-out-of-words-and-hope-amid-the-chaos/ Mon, 08 Jun 2020 21:03:45 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=46760 COMMENT: By Bryan Bruce

Every time I wrote a sentence to describe the slow motion collision of social, economic and political forces that are simultaneously destroying and reshaping societies around the world, I would erase it .

Not “writer’s block” so much as “writer’s inadequacy” – feeling torn between using “revolution” or “evolution” to describe the events on my news feeds over the last few days.

READ MORE: Towards a global intifada

I tried writing a list. (An old trick I have when trying to find a pattern in an apparent chaos):

  • America has an absentee President
  • The murder of George Floyd. Black Lives Matter.
  • Stock markets are on the rise.
  • Peaceful Whitehouse protest attacked by police so Trump can hold up a Bible for a photo op.
  • Houses are selling again – some below CV, some ridiculously above.
  • Worldwide covid-19 is still killing thousands of people everyday .
  • A second virus wave is a real fear so our borders are closed… except, entertainment is suddenly deemed an essential industry and Hollywood moguls get a free pass.
  • Essential workers who helped keep us alive during the lockdown still receive the lowest pay.
  • China is back to a 90 percent economy.
  • America has the highest unemployment rate since the Great Depression.
  • Locally there are a lot of empty shops, a sudden rash of “for lease signs” on office and warehouse properties, and evidence of a hotel industry in trouble.

The list doesn’t help.

For every positive sign I find suggesting a new more egalitarian post-covid-19 world will emerge, contra-indicators reveal the vested interests in the old order are still very much alive and kicking.

Another old trick
So I try another old trick. The History Review:

I ask myself is this moment unique? Have we been here before?

Answer? Yes and no.

Yes – in some societies there have been moments of very rapid social change when the existing social order has been suddenly overthrown. The French, American and Russian revolutions being three obvious examples.

No – because, this time, whatever is happening is a global phenomenon made possible by the invention of the internet and global air travel – two technologies that have transformed our mental and physical world so that Queen Street is now just around our mental corner from Wall Street and a virus born in Wuhan today can fly to Washington or Wellington and be living in us tomorrow.

So where are the words to describe what is happening ?

I turn to some old friends for help.

Charles Dickens:

“It was the best times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period.” (A Tale of Two Cities)

W.B. Yeats writing after the chaos of WW1:

“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.” (The Second Coming)

Pandemics are not new.

Social chaos is not new.

The battle between Good and Evil is as old as human conscience.

Somehow, despite all our short comings as a species, we are still here.

Perhaps, in that, there is some hope.

Bryan Bruce is one of New Zealand’s most respected documentary makers and public intellectuals who has tirelessly exposed the NZ neoliberal economic settings as the main cause for social problems. He blogs at The Daily Blog where this column was first published here. Republished with the author’s permission.

]]> James Tapp: Confronting Pākehā Privilege as a white male student https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/05/30/james-tapp-confronting-pakeha-privilege-as-a-white-male-student/ Fri, 29 May 2020 22:02:13 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=46455
COMMENT: By James Tapp

It’s only been a year and half since I started university, but sometimes that’s enough time to realise more about the world than you could ever imagine. For me, the biggest thing, the one thing intertwined into every part of my life, is privilege.

I’m a white male, and if society loves anything, it’s straight white males. It was only when I left my all-boys high school that I became aware of the licence that my physicality held. It seemed so normal to me at the time, so much so that I never had the tendency to question or reflect on my own privilege.

But in my day to day life, I continued winning the lottery.

READ MORE: New Zealand as a village – our people

I think an important place to start on a topic like this is representation. Not just the statistics around what percentage of the population is Pākehā, Māori, Pasifika, Asian and Middle Eastern, along the many other ethnic backgrounds in Aotearoa, but also what we, as individuals represent, as well as how we present society.

Last year we saw Statistics New Zealand release a report that reflected NZ diversity in the form of a 112-person village. The village was composed of 17 individuals having a Māori ethnic background, 70 with European, 15 Asian, 8 Pacifica, and 2 from the rest of the world.

Of course, this representation is not going to be the same across all areas of society, but it could be a hell of a lot better.

When it comes to making change, for me it is in my career choices. I want to represent my country, whether it’s at an embassy, working as a journalist or even a business leader. Yet I remind myself that if New Zealand society is going to have good representation across the board, it probably shouldn’t be me. Because there’s 1001 white men in business suits already ‘representing’ New Zealand.

How many cared about Ihumātao?
You’ve got to ask, how many of them cared about Ihumātao, and if they were representing that struggle? Representation in New Zealand is always going to be difficult, especially in areas such as Auckland and Wellington which are melting pots of culture with so much to represent.

So, as students going into the workforce,remember you bring a new perspective, which also comes with great power. It is vital to keep both your privileges in check and that of your peers, while also putting in the effort to make sure diversity is celebrated.

While that is all about under representation, which is not amazing, the statistics around over representation are far more shocking. In 2019, 51.8 percent of the prison population was Māori, while they only make up 14.6 percent of the population.

Since the English arrived in New Zealand, anyone who they considered different has been on the backfoot, with a lack of acknowledgement of minority and indigenous ideology and way of life.

In saying this, it is important to remember these are not the only populations within Aotearoa; with our country being exposed to globalisation we have seen an influx of diversity and culture. One of these major ethnic groups is the Asian population, which includes a number of ethnicities, such as Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Sri Lankan, Singaporean and Malaysian among so many more.

The Chinese population particularly have a stronger representation in New Zealand in good light as well as not so good. With history in gold mining in Arrowtown, having the longest running produce stores in the country, as well as running so many other small businesses, it is truly saddening to see xenophobia still so present in New Zealand when they are part of the backbone that our country depends on.

With the Asian population expected to rise above 1 million by 2038, we will need to be able to embrace this past by eating sushi for lunch and going to the lantern festival, instead realising terms such as “token Asian” are outdated and inaccurate which instead facilitate casual racism.

Pride in being multicultural but …?
New Zealand may pride itself on being multicultural and accepting, but all it takes is a quick scroll down a New Zealand Herald article about welfare issues to see Pākehā Privilege. And many of you, including myself, realise these people are our grandparents or maybe even our parents.

If they’re as bad as my grandmother, they’ll say they can’t understand someone on the phone who has an accent which isn’t from a country where English is their first language. Racism is still very much a problem in New Zealand, whether it is ingrained into our history due to the land wars, or it’s taking clothing of traditional significance and incorporating it into everyday life without recognition (kimonos as dressing gowns, for example). These everyday events may seem harmless at the time, however research has shown these can slowly but surely build up to oppression, discrimination and violence without recognition and intervention.

This is how events such as the Christchurch attacks happen. While they weren’t an accurate representation of the Pākehā population, just imagine if he had been of any other ethnicity. Imagine what would have been different in the media. Imagine what my grandparents would have said. This can all go unchecked, and that’s what unrecognised white privilege can look like.

I think it’s also important to point out Pākehā Privilege is part of New Zealand culture, whether we like it or not, and because it’s part of daily life for many, it goes unrecognised as culture. And it’s not as simple as saying to someone “hey this is your culture, also guess what, it’s done a lot of damage.”

Culture among white people is thriving, but because of the dominance of Western society, we just don’t see it. Hence, we get the “white people have no culture” comments, but we also get ones about Karen’s and typical middle-class white dad jokes, and whether you like it or not, that’s part of it.

If society, particularly in New Zealand, is going to progress, we need to recognise where Pākehā stand in relation to the rest of New Zealand and why. But as many things go, small things at a young age will go far.

What would things look like if we looked past just Pākehā and Māori culture at school, but also a number of others which are now prominent in Aotearoa? What if we saw more incorporation of Māori schools of thought into business on a managerial level? What if this also applied to the government with a greater recognition of Te Tiriti o Waitangi?

We operate in systems that are westernised
We currently operate in systems that are westernised, because that was version 1.0 that was brought to Aotearoa by colonists. But with so much more here now, what is there to stop us from growing and expanding and reaching 2.0?

I’ve covered a miniscule amount of information surrounding society in New Zealand, but if there’s anything I want you to take away from reading this, it’s that if you are Pākehā, or even just have white skin, recognise your privilege on a constant basis, and use it to help others.

I’ve been given a lot of opportunities while I’ve been at university, and while I’ve worked hard, I still think about how other factors may have played a part. And while this has focused on Pākehā Privilege, think about what other privileges you may have and how they play a part in your life.

Talk with those who you consider “other” instead of the same, find out where people’s viewpoints stand and why. You never know, you might learn a thing or two.

James Tapp is a Bachelor of Communication Studies and Bachelor of Business conjoint student at Auckland University of Technology, majoring in international business and advertising creativity. He is also producer of the Pacific Media Centre’s Southern Cross radio programme on 95bFM. This article was first published in the AUT student publication Debate and is republished here with permission.

]]> Sue Bradford: Labour betrays its traditions – and most vulnerable – with two-tier welfare payments https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/05/26/sue-bradford-labour-betrays-its-traditions-and-most-vulnerable-with-two-tier-welfare-payments/ Tue, 26 May 2020 07:37:24 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=46341

COMMENT: By Sue Bradford for Pundit and RNZ News

In the age of covid-19 we are Jacinda’s team of five million, except for some.

There has rarely been a more blatant case of discrimination against beneficiaries than Grant Robertson’s announcement yesterday that people who have lost their jobs because of the coronavirus will receive weekly payments of $490 per week for 12 weeks and $250 per week for part time workers.

This is great news for those who qualify. Fabulous. That $490 per week is almost double the $250 per week you get on the standard 25+ Jobseeker Allowance and much closer to anything approaching a liveable minimal income.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – WHO sounds warning on covid second peak

On top of that, the new benefit also allows people in relationships to access support if they meet the criteria and their partner earns less than $2000 per week before tax.

And unlike the usual system, the new payments do not appear to be age dependent. So the historically ridiculous assumption that the younger you are, the less money you need to live on does not apply to this new category of claimants.

In extending this support to one group of unemployed people – those losing their jobs because of covid-19 between 1 March and 30 October 2020 – the Labour-led government has, inadvertently or otherwise, made even more apparent the urgency of the recommendations made in 2018 by its very own Welfare Expert Advisory Group (WEAG).

These include lifting benefit levels, introducing individual entitlement to Jobseeker Support while retaining a couple-based income test, and removing youth rates for main benefits.

Why not all?
If some people deserve higher benefits, to be treated as individuals when they lose their jobs, and to not have lower benefits because they are under 25, why not all?

Labour has revealed once again its decades-long predilection for categorising people into the “deserving” and “undeserving” poor, an ideology straight out of the 19th century England from which many Pākehā settler forebears came.

It is also impossible not to speculate that this is a rather unsubtle way of shoring up support for the government in the months leading up to the election. For the newly unemployed, a higher benefit for the period ending October 30 fits nicely with the September 19 election date.

Many of us who have been spent decades fighting out here in the community for the rights of unemployed workers and beneficiaries were hoping that the covid-19 crisis would mean a transformational shift in how political parties viewed the welfare system.

With so many people likely to become newly jobless, surely the pressure on Labour and its partners would be enough to jolt this government into, for example, implementing the WEAG recommendations, and/or establishing an equitable and sufficient basic income.

Instead, Labour seems to believe that the rightful admiration they’ve earned with their effective action on the health aspects of the virus allows them to carry on as usual when it comes to the fate of the most vulnerable people in the country, including a disproportionate number of Māori, Pasifika and stranded migrant workers.

With the September election in sight, Labour is declaring that people who are on benefits not related to covid-19-related unemployment or are stranded migrants simply don’t matter; that their votes – if they do vote – don’t count.

Flawed, punitive welfare system
For over three decades, we’ve had governments who politically and through the administration of a flawed, punitive welfare system have blamed unemployed people and beneficiaries for their situation, rather than treating “them” as “us”.

Yesterday, Labour brought this two-class system into stark focus once again, as it did when it introduced the discriminatory “In Work” payment as part of Working for Families back in the mid-2000s.

During his Budget speech on May 14, Grant Robertson evoked the “great traditions of the First Labour government who rebuilt New Zealand after the Great Depression”.

I reckon the employed and unemployed workers and their families who brought the first Labour government to power in 1935 would be scandalised by Robertson’s evocation of that era at a time when his government is entrenching a brutal divide between the worthy and unworthy poor.

With a hefty lead in the polls, a support party in the Greens who back welfare reform and a population which faces the gravity of high and rising unemployment daily, now is the time for the transformation of our welfare system.

Labour – you could do it, if you only listened to the calls of your true political ancestors and to the voices of all those who most need help now – not just some of them.

Dr Sue Bradford was a Green MP for 10 years 1999-2009, with a focus on employment, social services, economic development and childrens’ issues. Prior to that she worked for 16 years in the unemployed workers’ movement. She continues to be active on community and political issues.This article was first published by Pundit and RNZ today and the Pacific Media Centre/Asia Pacific Report has a partnership agreement with RNZ. This article is republished with the permission of the author.

]]> Lockdown social cohesion likely to fall as ‘acute’ phase ends, say scientists https://asiapacificreport.nz/2020/05/05/lockdown-social-cohesion-likely-to-fall-as-acute-phase-ends-say-scientists/ Mon, 04 May 2020 12:05:11 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=45420 By RNZ News

The sense of national unity felt during the Covid-19 lockdown may disappear as social isolation and economic costs hit home, a report by leading social scientists warns.

Koi Tū: the Centre for Informed Futures from the University of Auckland has released a discussion paper outlining potential difficulties as restrictions lift.

It argues that social cohesion must be a key consideration for policymakers in a post-Covid-19 world.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Some countries begin easing lockdowns

Koi Tū director Sir Peter Gluckman said the level of community compliance and collective purpose shown during the fight against Covid-19 has rarely been seen outside wartime.

He warned this would likely begin to waver as the country moved out of the acute phase and the implications of the lockdown became apparent.

“Already, we’re seeing a rise in tension between conflicting economic and health interests. Sectors are starting to compete for attention. Some are in hurry to return to a pre-covid life; others see the opportunity for a major reset,” Sir Peter said.

“Many lives have been fundamentally changed, and for those people, the new ‘normal’ is full of huge uncertainty. That is where social cohesion will start to break down and the mental well-being of many will be further affected.”

Enhanced cohesion
As well as Sir Peter, the paper was written by Professor Paul Spoonley, Anne Bardsley, Tracey McIntosh, Rangimarie Hunia, Sarb Johal and Richie Poulton and informed by a larger group of mental health experts.

Professor Spoonley said enhanced cohesion was often seen in the initial response to major crises as communities pulled together against a common threat.

However, as the situation evolved over time, social cohesion could be lost and may even become worse than before the crisis.

“We cannot be complacent. Social cohesion is a major asset for New Zealand. A cohesive, safe and Covid-free country will enhance New Zealand’s global reputation and help project our place in the world – with positive flow on effects for our economy,” he said.

“But once lost, it becomes extremely difficult to restore, especially when there is both increased uncertainty and new forms of inequality.”

Sir Peter said that in the coming months and years, there would be many decisions made by government, individuals and businesses to recover from the crisis.

There would be a need to look for the advantages of the “new normal” that would emerge, he said.

No new NZ cases
There were no new cases of covid-19 confirmed in New Zealand today, but one probable case has been reclassified as confirmed.

Today’s news briefing. Video: RNZ News

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said that meant New Zealand’s total of confirmed and probable cases remained the same at 1487. The total number of confirmed cases is 1137.

Dr Bloomfield said there had been no additional deaths, leaving New Zealand’s total at 20.

The last time there was 0 new cases was on March 16.

Yesterday 2473 tests were done. The total number of completed tests is 152,696.

There are seven cases in hospital, and none are intensive care.

The number of clusters in NZ remains at 16, three of them have now been closed as there have been no cases of community transmission in the past few days.

“Clearly these are encouraging figures today, but it is just one moment in time. The real test is later this week when we factor in the incubation period for the virus and the time it takes for people to display symptoms which is generally five to six days after exposure,” Dr Bloomfield said.

Covid update for 4 May
Covid-19 update graphic for May 4: RNZ
  • This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.
  • If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 (+64 9 358 5453 for international SIMs) or call your GP – don’t show up at a medical centre.
  • Follow RNZ’s coronavirus newsfeed
]]> Scott Waide: My message to PNG’s Prime Minister James Marape https://asiapacificreport.nz/2019/05/31/scott-waide-my-message-to-pngs-prime-minister-james-marape/ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2019/05/31/scott-waide-my-message-to-pngs-prime-minister-james-marape/#comments Fri, 31 May 2019 11:56:05 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=38469 COMMENTARY: By Scott Waide in Lae

As the new Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, you have your work cut out for you. You have to try to get a lot of it done within two years before the 2022 elections.

That’s a big job.

Do what is right by the people. Listen to their voices through social media. Not all of it is fake news. Take counsel from those who disagree with you, publicly and privately, in the interest of your 10 million people.

READ MORE: PNG prime minister reveals caretaker cabinet

Be brave enough to listen to the criticisms and find the threads of truth in them.

Be truthful about the state of Papua New Guinea’s health system. The people of Papua New Guinea deserve a government that tells the truth. There is a severe shortage of medicine. Puka Temu did a bad job and he did not admit to it as Health Minister.

Many of our aid posts are closed and our hospitals don’t have medicine. Yet the media is accused of “being political” when we highlight these “open secrets”.

Be truthful about the Tuition Fee Free Education (TFF). It’s not working for us. Our schools don’t get the money on time.

Tell people straight
If we have to pay for school fees, tell that to the people straight as it is. Papua New Guineans are resilient and hard working. They do not deserve to be lied to.

Please appoint an education minister who will find out why teachers continue to have their pays cut when they do not have outstanding loans.

Remove the companies that are benefiting from the cumbersome procurement processed in the health and education at the expense of our people. Investigate and prosecute the kaikaiman and kaikaimeri who suck the systems dry. Send them to jail.

Provide housing for our people.

Fix the National Housing Corporation. It is a hub of corruption that has existed for decades. Papua New Guineans deserve affordable housing not unaffordable rentals meant for fly-in-fly-out company executives. They deserve a government that has the guts to dump the garbage and restore integrity.

Lower the taxes. Our people are suffering. Tax the companies that enjoy tax holidays.

Reduce internet costs. If we are going to empower our millennials, make it easy for them to be independent of their parents. Make it possible for them to own their own homes by providing the means for them to make money from tools they grew up with.

Don’t kowtow to foreign interests
They deserve a government that is able to stand up for them and not kowtow to foreign interests.

We have agreed, as a government, add to the miseries of other human beings by keeping them in a prison camp on Manus in exchange for aid. We cannot continue with that shameful legacy.

Don’t persecute the media. Don’t threaten journalists. It doesn’t do much for your credibility.

There’s a lot to be said and not enough time and space.

One final thing: For goodness sake, sell the Maseratis. Get back our money. It was of no benefit to us in the first place.

You were part of a government that bought them during APEC. Please do the right thing by the people and get rid of them.

Scott Waide’s blog columns are frequently published by Asia Pacific Report with permission. He is also EMTV deputy news editor based in Lae.

]]> https://asiapacificreport.nz/2019/05/31/scott-waide-my-message-to-pngs-prime-minister-james-marape/feed/ 1 Crisis? What crisis? A new PNG prime minister might not signal much change https://asiapacificreport.nz/2019/05/29/crisis-what-crisis-a-new-png-prime-minister-might-not-signal-much-change/ Tue, 28 May 2019 20:30:01 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=38388 BACKGROUND: By Jonathan Ritchie of Deakin University

In recent days, Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister Peter O’Neill has announced his resignation, failed to formally resign, and is now taking legal action to prevent a parliamentary vote to remove him from office.

For most of PNG’s more than eight million inhabitants, today will not be substantially different from any other day. It will be a day of toil, hardship, humour, love, fear – and of negotiating how to survive in PNG’s villages and squatter settlements.

There are crises aplenty in the lives of these Papua New Guineans, but most won’t be worrying too much about the crisis unfolding in the nation’s capital, Port Moresby.

READ MORE: If there’s one thing Pacific nations don’t need, it’s yet another infrastructure investment bank

Yet, this dispute is dominating the waking hours of the educated urbanites and social media commentators there and in the country’s major centres – as well as a small group of people watching PNG from Australia, and elsewhere.

Will Peter O’Neill really resign? Will he somehow manage to cling to the prime ministership? Will he leave, only to be replaced by one of his allies through whom he could continue to exercise power?

A reshuffling of political cards
While we acknowledge the divide between the great majority of struggling Papua New Guineans and PNG’s elites, we should not minimise the importance of the current crisis engulfing the country.

O’Neill’s departure has the potential for a wholesale shift in the policy direction taken by PNG’s government.

It could result in PNG moving away from the big spending on major projects of the past few years, which many Papua New Guineans see as having benefited Port Moresby at the expense of everywhere else in this still largely rural nation.

But the suspicion of at least some informed Papua New Guinean observers is that it will result only in the rearranging of the deck chairs. A reshuffling of the cards that will lead to another privileged insider, another member of PNG’s political class, taking over the PM’s role from the mostly unlamented O’Neill.

Rural citizens are disenfranchised and disengaged
Despite their apparent failure in Australia’s recent federal election, most people would still agree that polls and surveys are a valuable way of gauging popular opinion.

One of the more curious (and frustrating) aspects of PNG’s public affairs is that there has never been a successful attempt to conduct systematic and reasonably reliable opinion surveying.

This means that it is basically impossible to say with any certainty what “the average Papua New Guinean” thinks about O’Neill and the current political crisis. We don’t really know if O’Neill’s departure would be celebrated, or mourned.

PNG’s geographical challenges, along with inadequate transport and communication structures, suggest that most people will hear the news of Port Moresby politics at several removes.

Should they feel sufficiently energised to want to act on what they hear – well, events will have moved on by that time.

Most Papua New Guineans living in villages, in highland valleys, islands, or other remote places, are disenfranchised, and certainly disengaged, from what goes on in Port Moresby.

The same observation could be made about the people who live in the mushrooming settlements in Port Moresby, Lae, Mt Hagen, and other centres. Even if they are notionally urban dwellers, their connection with the complexities of these events is remote.

So we tend to rely on what we hear from the city residents who are more engaged in public life, and especially those who are social media-savvy.

City-dwellers resent O’Neill
What this group thinks about the O’Neill situation is fairly apparent. Ever since he replaced the ailing Sir Michael Somare as Prime Minister in 2011, resentment against O’Neill has been expressed in a range of forums (including social media, to the annoyance of O’Neill and his supporters).

The wave of anger has built over the years since then, and has crested recently with the revelations about O’Neill’s involvement with the Oil Search-UBS loan affair, which many regard as confirming every suspicion they held about the Prime Minister’s character.

The A$1.2 billion loan from the Swiss UBS bank, which enabled the PNG government to buy shares in Oil Search Ltd, was, in the words of PNG’s Ombudsman Commission, “highly inappropriate”. It was undertaken in the face of contrary advice from PNG’s then Treasurer, Don Polye, whom O’Neill sacked.

Anti-O’Neill sentiment over the years failed to garner much support from the Members of PNG’s National Parliament. Until very recently, O’Neill’s People’s National Congress (PNC) and its coalition partners dominated the House.

Crucially, and mostly driven by the UBS revelations, this has now changed.

The prime minister is becoming increasingly isolated as more parliamentarians defect from the O’Neill party to join the disparate collection of MPs who are gathering at one of Port Moresby’s luxury hotels.

While some social media commentators reckon that his recent “resignation” may be merely a ploy, it is looking like the game might be up for Peter O’Neill – unless through the cunning and political adeptness he is known for, he is still able to turn the tables on his political enemies.

At the time of writing, O’Neill is pursuing action in the PNG Supreme Court over the legality of a “vote of no confidence” in his government.

Leadership not the only crisis
There is a crisis in PNG at the moment. Indeed, there are several. The country is suffering from significant health issues, ranging from the reappearance of TB and polio to the inadequacy of its pharmaceutical and medical supplies.

In October, the people of Bougainville may vote to secede from the rest of the country, of which they have been part since 1975.

The billions of kina spent on development has largely been confined to the cities, and most Papua New Guineans have experienced little change in their living standards over the past four decades.

These are the real challenges facing PNG, and the current leadership crisis in Port Moresby might – or, as some fear, might not – produce a meaningful response to them.

]]> Media freedom in Pacific a growing challenge, says journalism academic https://asiapacificreport.nz/2018/11/30/media-freedom-in-pacific-a-growing-challenge-says-journalism-academic/ https://asiapacificreport.nz/2018/11/30/media-freedom-in-pacific-a-growing-challenge-says-journalism-academic/#comments Fri, 30 Nov 2018 10:36:49 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=34562 By Blessen Tom

Pacific media freedom and ignorance of Pacific issues by mainstream media in New Zealand are growing challenges for the region, says a journalism academic

“There are so many issues in the Pacific that are simply ignored by the mainstream media,” Pacific Media Centre director Professor Robie bluntly told the two-day Oceans and Islands conference for Pacific researchers that ended in the Fale Pasifika at Auckland University today.

He cited the ongoing human rights situation in West Papua – which will be marked tomorrow with flag raising ceremonies across New Zealand – and the recent New Caledonian independence referendum as examples of poorly covered issues.

READ MORE: The NZ news item that sparked the Scott Waide saga

The conference was hosted by the NZ Institute for Pacific Research, a NZ government-funded consortium of Auckland University, Otago University and Auckland University of Technology (AUT).

A Maserati luxury sedan as portrayed in the controversial news item shown in EMTV. Image: EMTV screenshot

Addressing the centre’s research and public strategy, Dr Robie also shared his concerns about media freedom in the Pacific region and highlighted this week’s dramatic developments in Papua New Guinea in the wake of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference.

Scott Waide, one of the country’s most high profile and influential journalists, was secretly suspended over broadcasting a New Zealand television news item that criticised government spending on 40 Maserati luxury sedans.

Waide, deputy regional news editor of EMTV and who blogs on social issues in his My Land, My Country website, was reinstated a day after news of his suspension was leaked through social media networks, sparking a flurry of protests in international media.

“This outrageous meddling by the state-owned Telikom company’s board was kept quiet for a week until it finally went viral last Sunday.

‘Blatant censorship’
“This blatant act of censorship – publicly defended by Prime Minister Peter O’Neill – rebounded heavily on the government.”

Dr Robie, who is also the convenor of the PMC’s Pacific Media Watch freedom project in collaboration with international press watchdogs such as the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders, criticised corporate and political inference in PNG’s news and current affairs media.

He said what had happened was salutary for Pacific press freedoms. While he described the reinstatement for Waide as a victory for media freedom in the region, he said the journalists’ own reflective comments were “lessons for the rest of the Pacific”.

AUT’s Professor David Robie … critical of political and corporate “meddling” with Pacific media freedom. Image: Blessen Tom/PMC

“Papua New Guinea is a democracy and the media is free to hold those in authority to account,” Waide had said on his blog. “This means highlighting flaws in policy and making sure mistakes are pointed out and corrected. It is an essential part of our democracy.”

Dr Robie cited the Waide suspension as an example of some of the research, publication and storytelling provided by the PMC.

“We try to give lot more storytelling with Pacific voices and Pacific context,” he said.

“We try to provide an outlet for Pacific views and also information right across the region.”

Professional development
AUT’s PMC in the School of Communication Studies operated as independent university-based educational media by providing space for postgraduate students to have their stories published and broadcast for professional development.

This had contributed a lot to Pacific storytelling, he said.

“If we do things independently media-wise, there are a lot of stories that we can tell that much of the mainstream just ignores.”


The Pacific Media Centre’s Professor David Robie talks Pacific storytelling. Video: Blessen Tom/PMC

PMC publishes the following media:

• An online general news and current affairs website called Asia-Pacific Report and PMC Online which focuses on media issues and research.

• Its own YouTube (more than 200,000 viewers) and Soundcloud channels.

• Pacific Journalism Review, a peer reviewed journal, the only New Zealand-based publication specialising in journalism, media issues, communication and diversity in the South Pacific, Asia Pacific, Australia and New Zealand.

PJR is ranked on the SCOPUS metrics database and is in its 25th year of publication and is hosted on the open access indigenous research platform Tuwhera at Auckland University of Technology.

• Pacific Journalism Monographs, a peer-reviewed research companion to Pacific Journalism Review, which publishes longer research projects in an online and booklet format.

• Southern Cross, a weekly radio programme on Pacific affairs run by the PMC on Radio 95bfm at the University of Auckland.

Strong links
The PMC also has strong links with the University of the South Pacific journalism programme (Fiji) and Gadjah Mada University’s Centre for Southeast Asian Studies in Indonesia and the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre in the Philippines, and community publishing partnerships with organisations such as RNZ Pacific.

Professor Robie also mentioned PMC’s three-year-old Bearing Witness climate change project and talked about its “outstanding results” by award-winning postgraduate students reporting environmental issues.

He screened the trailer of Banabans of Rabi – A Story of Survival, a short documentary by Hele Ikimotu and Blessen Tom that was premiered at the Nuku’alofa International Film festival last week.

The inaugural Oceans and Islands conference concluded today.

Sri Krishnamurthi and Blessen Tom of the Pacific Media Centre are working as part of a PMC partnership with the NZ Institute for Pacific Research.

AUT’s Professor David Robie with two colleagues at the NZIPR Oceans and Islands conference. Image: NZIPR

 

]]> https://asiapacificreport.nz/2018/11/30/media-freedom-in-pacific-a-growing-challenge-says-journalism-academic/feed/ 1 Housing trust chief slams ‘short cuts’ approach to NZ homes crisis https://asiapacificreport.nz/2018/10/26/housing-trust-chief-slams-short-cuts-approach-to-nz-homes-crisis/ Fri, 26 Oct 2018 00:21:08 +0000 https://asiapacificreport.nz/?p=33139 By Rahul Bhattarai

A housing trust chief executive has condemned the government for taking “short cuts” to tackle New Zealand’s housing crisis.

“We need to stop pulling rabbits out of hats and looking for quick fixes,” said Bernie Smith, CEO of Monte Cecilia Housing Trust.

Speaking at the annual Bruce Jesson Foundation lecture in Auckland on the topic “housing crisis – a smoking gun with no silver bullet”, he soundly criticised the government for not doing enough to provide affordable housing.

“A bit dramatic but I am known to be dramatic from time to time.”

READ MORE: Tūhoe leader’s address to deliver ‘hard truths’ about New Zealand

He said that there were no short-cuts to building affordable housing.

Smith has 40 years of experience in various forms of leadership in state and local government and not-for-profit sector.

The lecture has been delivered in previous years by prominent figures such as investigative journalist Nicky Hager and a former prime minister, David Lange, in honour of the late journalist and political thinker Bruce Jesson.

Bernie Smith … “We need to stop the blame game, we need to stop thinking central or local government will resolve this issue.” Image: Rahul Bhattarai/PMC

Work together
To resolve the housing crisis, Smith said the government and bureaucrats needed to work together and have a generational housing strategy that “builds strong housing communities for the present and the future generations”.

The coalition has been in government for 11 months and it has been “claiming all the issues that we are confronted with today are solely due to previous government”, he said.

“We need to stop the blame game, we need to stop thinking central or local government will resolve this issue, that housing first or some other programme is a quick fix,” he said.

Barry Wilson, president of Auckland Council for Civil Liberties, said that the political parties should be working together to “house the homeless in a comfortable secure condition”.

“There should be some unified political approach, it’s not productive every time they change the government,” Wilson said.

Long term strategy
New Zealand needs a 25 to 30-year-long housing strategy “that every political party agrees and signs to”, Smith said

“Labour has a plan that National is trying to drag down. What they should do is be working together on a long-term plan, not one that depends on the three-year election cycle,” Wilson said.

New Zealand housing strategy should be created not by the politicians or bureaucrats, rather by the people from the community, who have lived with experience, like the homeless, the renters, community housing providers, and people form wide ethnic communities including Māori or Pasifika, Smith said.

“A strategy that looks at the whole of the continuum and recognises into generational living affordable rentals, affordable home ownership, does not forget a strategy that includes building strong healthy and safe communities with clear mile stones and targets,” he said.

Smith said the country needed to have a strategy that is housing community “value” focused rather than the housing “volume” focused.

Community value was focused when each and every individual is seen as equal no matter their housing option, either state housing, private renter, or an owner-occupier.

Overcrowded households
In Auckland there are 92,000 households living in unaffordable rental situations spending more than the 30 percent of their net income on rent.

“Thirty six thousand households living in overcrowded conditions.”

In Auckland alone, there is 20,300 homeless people, where the Māori population is five times and Pasifika 10 times more disproportionately affected.

Kiwi Build was not an affordable housing solution to many New Zealanders as it was only affordable to middle class people with higher household incomes, Smith said.

Smith said it was noted at a recent Kiwi Build Affordability meeting with Auckland city mayor Phil Goff:

“Auckland Council’s chief economist stated in July that to buy a 3-bedroom Kiwi Build house at $650,000 they will need either an income of $106,000 with a $130k (20 percent) deposit or an income of $120,000 and a $65,000 (10 percent deposit) for the household to affordably purchase a Kiwi Build home (and that is with debt servicing ratio of 35 percent.

“This means that Kiwi Build houses are only affordable for the top 40 percent of Auckland’s households.”

• Housing issue not just ethnic – Pākehā leaders have ‘failed’, says author
• Pasifika voters want ‘hand-ups, not hand-outs’ in NZ housing crisis

The Auckland housing continuum. Image: Rahul Bhattarai/PMC
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