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The Queen taught kapa haka, or Maori performing arts, while attending the University of Waikato and has a master’s degree in Maori cultural studies from the same institution.
Maori Queen Nga Wai Hono i te Po Paki in 2019.Credit: NZ Government/CC
In 2020, she was appointed to the Waitangi National Trust, a body that advises on the signing place of the Treaty of Waitangi, the 1840 governance agreement between the British Crown and Maori that underpins claims of Maori sovereignty.
In a university interview, she described how shaped she was by her Maori identity.
“I walk around my house, and I see a taiaha,” or traditional Maori weapon, she said. “I go home to my parents’ house, and my little nephew is there, and he’s trying to do the haka [dance]. So it is just everywhere. I’ve been brought up in it, I am it.”
Former prime minister Chris Hipkins, leader of the main opposition Labour Party, praised the new monarch for having “an incredible wealth” of knowledge about her culture, adding the Queen would be “committed to looking after her people”.
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Her leadership could be tested by intense friction with the conservative government, however.
After paying his respects to Tuheitia earlier in the week, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon wrote on social media that he welcomed the new Queen, “who carries forward the mantle of leadership left by her father.” He is on a visit to Asia and did not attend the burial.
But Luxon’s coalition government is often accused of being “anti-Maori” and was booed and heckled during a February meeting with Maori leaders.
The coffin with the body of New Zealand’s Maori King, Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII, is carried after being transported on a waka (a traditional canoe) for burial in Ngaruawahia.Credit: AP
The government has said it wants to end “race-based” policies and minimise Maori language in the public service. It quickly scrapped a Maori health agency. And it has also pledged to review the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.
The libertarian ACT Party, a junior coalition partner, wants to go further, pushing for a referendum on the treaty and calling Maori co-governance undemocratic.
Maori have been disadvantaged ever since the treaty was signed, experts say, leading to their over-representation in unemployment, poverty and crime statistics and to worse health and education outcomes than the White population’s.
In January, Nga Wai Hono i te Po stood at her father’s side as the king summoned thousands of Maori to discuss the government’s plan.
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“The best protest we can do right now is be Maori, be who we are, live our values,” Tuheitia said. “Just be Maori, Maori all day, every day, we are here, we are strong.”
On Thursday, thousands of Maori gathered once more, this time to watch warriors paddle the king’s coffin down the Waikato River to the sacred Taupiri mountain, where he was to be buried.
The Queen accompanied the coffin. And as the two monarchs passed – father and daughter, past and future – mourners gathered along the riverbanks to perform a haka.