Ngā Tamatoa
Ngā Tamatoa was a Māori activist group that operated throughout the 1970s to promote Māori rights, fight racial discrimination, and confront injustices perpetrated by the New Zealand Government, particularly violations of the Treaty of Waitangi.
Origins
Ngā Tamatoa emerged from a conference at the University of Auckland organised by academic and historian Ranginui Walker. The group was inspired by international liberation and indigenous movements such as the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement which characterised the New Left of the 1970s internationally. Syd Jackson, one of the founding members of Ngā Tamatoa, drew from the works of Eldridge Cleaver and Stokely Carmichael. Ngā Tamatoa often worked alongside the Polynesian Panthers, who also drew direct inspiration from the Black Panther Party.Member Taura Eruera said of the group's beginning "Our tohu at the time was tama tu, tama ora, tama noho, tama mate, tamatoa — meaning stand up and do something, don't sit and do nothing."
Members of Ngā Tamatoa included Hone Harawira and his mother Titewhai Harawira, Donna Awatere Huata, Tame Iti, Jim Moriarty, Rawiri Paratene, Larry Parr, Hana Te Hemara, Kura Te Waru Rewiri, Linda Tuhiwai Smith and Ngahuia Te Awekotuku. Tama Poata was a member who was also involved in other activist groups, Māori Organisation On Human Rights and Halt All Racist Tours, and was influential in the film and TV industry. Member Taitimu Maipi recounted the leadership of women in Ngā Tamatoa, describing efforts by Hilda Harawera in Māori language activism.
Māori language
In September 1972, Ngā Tamatoa presented a petition with more than 30,000 signatures to the Crown to have Māori taught in schools. Titewhai Harawera was strongly involved in this campaign for the Māori language with Ngā Tamatoa. She said in 2009:We were determined to rescue our language because we felt and we believed, and we believe today, that a people without its language is a people that die.