In New Zealand, we pride ourselves on fairness, equality, and opportunity. We are told that success comes from hard work, merit, and commitment. However, at Otago University’s medical school, one of the country’s most “prestigiously woke” institutions, that fundamental promise is being betrayed.
The recent revelations, shared by broadcaster Michael Laws on The Platform, paint a grim picture of racial discrimination being institutionalised through admission policies. According to official documents received under the OIA, students of Māori and Pacific Island descent can be admitted into the Otago medical programme with a grade average as low as 65 percent, while non-Māori students must achieve an average of around 91 percent. This is not a rumour or speculation. It is fact.
So, you’ve got two students, one Māori and one not. The Māori student gets 65 percent and walks in. The other gets 90 percent, sits psychometric tests, excels, and is still placed on a waitlist. This is academic apartheid. It's offensive. It’s patronising. And it tells Māori and Pacific people that the system doesn’t believe they’re capable of succeeding on their own merit.
It’s hard to overstate the implications of such a policy. Medical school is not just any academic programme. We are training future doctors, people who will be responsible for saving lives, making diagnoses, performing surgeries, and prescribing treatments. When entry into this critical profession is based on ethnicity over academic ability, we are putting ideology ahead of competence. In doing so, we are failing both our students and the patients they will one day serve.
The damage isn’t limited to just the students who are passed over. As Michael Laws pointed out, the very students admitted under these pathways often struggle with the academic load, drop out, and are left with debt and dashed dreams. Far from helping them, these race-based policies are setting them up to fail.
Worse still is the message it sends to talented Māori and Pacific students who could succeed on merit. It strips them of dignity and suggests their achievements are not real. It casts a shadow of doubt over every Māori doctor who did earn their place fairly. That's not uplifting or empowering. Excuse my te reo, but that’s f**king insulting.
So, you’ve got two students, one Māori and one not. The Māori student gets 65 percent and walks in. The other gets 90 percent, sits psychometric tests, excels, and is still placed on a waitlist. This is academic apartheid. It's offensive. It’s patronising. And it tells Māori and Pacific people that the system doesn’t believe they’re capable of succeeding on their own merit.
It’s hard to overstate the implications of such a policy. Medical school is not just any academic programme. We are training future doctors, people who will be responsible for saving lives, making diagnoses, performing surgeries, and prescribing treatments. When entry into this critical profession is based on ethnicity over academic ability, we are putting ideology ahead of competence. In doing so, we are failing both our students and the patients they will one day serve.
The damage isn’t limited to just the students who are passed over. As Michael Laws pointed out, the very students admitted under these pathways often struggle with the academic load, drop out, and are left with debt and dashed dreams. Far from helping them, these race-based policies are setting them up to fail.
Worse still is the message it sends to talented Māori and Pacific students who could succeed on merit. It strips them of dignity and suggests their achievements are not real. It casts a shadow of doubt over every Māori doctor who did earn their place fairly. That's not uplifting or empowering. Excuse my te reo, but that’s f**king insulting.
This isn’t about denying history or pretending that structural inequalities don’t exist. They do. But the answer to disadvantage is not reverse discrimination. The answer is fixing education earlier, providing support before university, and ensuring every Kiwi, regardless of background, has the tools they need to succeed.
Racial preference in a medical school, where lives are literally on the line, is dangerous and divisive. It is also unsustainable. We are already seeing the consequences, with some of our brightest young people looking to leave New Zealand entirely, disillusioned and demoralised by a country that values their whakapapa and tangata whenua status more than their effort.
Matua Kahurangi is just a bloke sharing thoughts on New Zealand and the world beyond. No fluff, just honest takes. He blogs on https://matuakahurangi.com/ where this article was sourced.
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