Just as I was about to grab lunch, Ani O’Brien flicked me a DM on X. No message, no context - just an image of what looked like a poster titled "Pae Tata Strategic Plan to 2030." It caught my eye immediately. Only a day earlier, I’d written about official OIA documents showing that Māori and Pacific Island students can get into the University of Otago’s medical school with grades as low as 65 percent, while non-Māori need to hit around 91. You can read that below.
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.
Apartheid has no place in New Zealand
Matua Kahurangi
26 Jun
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.
Read full story
The University of Otago has officially abandoned its founding mission of academic excellence. Its so-called “Pae Tata Strategic Plan to 2030” reads less like a blueprint for world-class education and more like a manifesto for cultural engineering. Buried under layers of Te Reo Māori, identity politics, and Treaty obsession, the university has transformed itself into a vessel for Māori-first policy.
This isn't a subtle shift. It is a total ideological capture. Otago’s strategy document makes it very clear: Māori identity and political appeasement now take precedence over research, academic merit, and genuine educational integrity.
Don’t just take my word for it, read it here - https://www.otago.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/314885/download-pae-tata-strategic-plan-to-2030-0245908.pd
Every page of Otago’s new strategic plan is drenched in race-based priorities. The document explicitly states that the University of Otago is to be “Te Tiriti-led,” which in practice means bending every aspect of operations, from hiring to curriculum, research to student services, around Māori cultural and political demands.
The focus on Māori is not just overrepresented. It is obsessive.
Whether it's the new Deputy Vice-Chancellor Māori position, mandatory Treaty "competence" for all staff, or the sweeping overhaul of course content to reflect Māori "worldviews," it’s clear: this university is no longer for all New Zealanders. It is for one politically protected group, and everyone else is expected to fall in line.
Otago’s leadership is compromised by tokenism
The plan openly promotes hiring and leadership decisions based on racial identity. Otago is no longer prioritising the best candidates for the job. It is prioritising whakapapa and iwi affiliation. Senior leadership is to “reflect” the Māori population. That is, quotas. The university is actively working toward racial representation in hiring, not academic excellence, not experience, not vision.
This is identity politics at its ugliest. It reduces individuals to their ethnicity and undermines the very idea of merit. In what world does a world-class university make race a precondition for advancement?
The answer is simple. In a world where the University of Otago’s administration has been taken hostage by ideology.
Pae Tata: A document of delusion
Otago’s Pae Tata strategy is riddled with vague, unmeasurable goals wrapped in feel-good jargon. “Partner with iwi,” “amplify Māori success,” “embed kaupapa Māori into research” - none of these mean anything unless you’re part of the academic elite fluent in the new ideological code. And that’s the point. The document isn’t written to solve real-world problems. It is written to signal virtue.
The university is pledging loyalty not to its students, staff, or academic rigour, but to a politicised interpretation of the Treaty of Waitangi. This includes the absurd goal of engineering a student body that is 25 percent Māori by 2040, regardless of application rates, academic standards, or interest. Pure fantasy.
Meanwhile, there’s barely a mention of how Otago plans to compete globally. STEM? Innovation? Global rankings? Attracting international talent? Irrelevant. What matters now is that your history professor can pronounce “manaakitanga” correctly.
Silencing and shaming staff
The strategy doesn’t stop at policy. It extends into behaviour. Otago is mandating that all staff, academic or not, undergo training in Treaty “obligations” and show “competency” in this ideology. This isn’t education. It is enforced conformity. If you challenge it, you’re labelled anti-Māori, colonial, or worse.
What message does this send to brilliant academics from overseas, or even from within New Zealand, who don’t want to be ideologically indoctrinated just to teach statistics or medicine? Simple. You're not welcome unless you toe the cultural line.
Academic freedom under attack
The most dangerous part of Otago’s Māori crusade is its effect on academic freedom. With every department expected to “centre Māori worldviews,” honest inquiry is being replaced with cultural compliance. Entire fields risk becoming politicised. Research will be filtered not by peer review, but by its alignment with identity politics.
This is not how a serious university behaves. This is how institutions rot from the inside out.
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.
Apartheid has no place in New Zealand
Matua Kahurangi
26 Jun
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.
Read full story
The University of Otago has officially abandoned its founding mission of academic excellence. Its so-called “Pae Tata Strategic Plan to 2030” reads less like a blueprint for world-class education and more like a manifesto for cultural engineering. Buried under layers of Te Reo Māori, identity politics, and Treaty obsession, the university has transformed itself into a vessel for Māori-first policy.
This isn't a subtle shift. It is a total ideological capture. Otago’s strategy document makes it very clear: Māori identity and political appeasement now take precedence over research, academic merit, and genuine educational integrity.
Don’t just take my word for it, read it here - https://www.otago.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/314885/download-pae-tata-strategic-plan-to-2030-0245908.pd
Every page of Otago’s new strategic plan is drenched in race-based priorities. The document explicitly states that the University of Otago is to be “Te Tiriti-led,” which in practice means bending every aspect of operations, from hiring to curriculum, research to student services, around Māori cultural and political demands.
The focus on Māori is not just overrepresented. It is obsessive.
Whether it's the new Deputy Vice-Chancellor Māori position, mandatory Treaty "competence" for all staff, or the sweeping overhaul of course content to reflect Māori "worldviews," it’s clear: this university is no longer for all New Zealanders. It is for one politically protected group, and everyone else is expected to fall in line.
Otago’s leadership is compromised by tokenism
The plan openly promotes hiring and leadership decisions based on racial identity. Otago is no longer prioritising the best candidates for the job. It is prioritising whakapapa and iwi affiliation. Senior leadership is to “reflect” the Māori population. That is, quotas. The university is actively working toward racial representation in hiring, not academic excellence, not experience, not vision.
This is identity politics at its ugliest. It reduces individuals to their ethnicity and undermines the very idea of merit. In what world does a world-class university make race a precondition for advancement?
The answer is simple. In a world where the University of Otago’s administration has been taken hostage by ideology.
Pae Tata: A document of delusion
Otago’s Pae Tata strategy is riddled with vague, unmeasurable goals wrapped in feel-good jargon. “Partner with iwi,” “amplify Māori success,” “embed kaupapa Māori into research” - none of these mean anything unless you’re part of the academic elite fluent in the new ideological code. And that’s the point. The document isn’t written to solve real-world problems. It is written to signal virtue.
The university is pledging loyalty not to its students, staff, or academic rigour, but to a politicised interpretation of the Treaty of Waitangi. This includes the absurd goal of engineering a student body that is 25 percent Māori by 2040, regardless of application rates, academic standards, or interest. Pure fantasy.
Meanwhile, there’s barely a mention of how Otago plans to compete globally. STEM? Innovation? Global rankings? Attracting international talent? Irrelevant. What matters now is that your history professor can pronounce “manaakitanga” correctly.
Silencing and shaming staff
The strategy doesn’t stop at policy. It extends into behaviour. Otago is mandating that all staff, academic or not, undergo training in Treaty “obligations” and show “competency” in this ideology. This isn’t education. It is enforced conformity. If you challenge it, you’re labelled anti-Māori, colonial, or worse.
What message does this send to brilliant academics from overseas, or even from within New Zealand, who don’t want to be ideologically indoctrinated just to teach statistics or medicine? Simple. You're not welcome unless you toe the cultural line.
Academic freedom under attack
The most dangerous part of Otago’s Māori crusade is its effect on academic freedom. With every department expected to “centre Māori worldviews,” honest inquiry is being replaced with cultural compliance. Entire fields risk becoming politicised. Research will be filtered not by peer review, but by its alignment with identity politics.
This is not how a serious university behaves. This is how institutions rot from the inside out.
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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