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Wednesday, November 5, 2025

David Farrar: The TPM putsch is on


Back on September 12 I blogged:

Reliable sources tell me this is much bigger than I realised. There is a huge split in TPM, basically between the Tamihere aligned MPs and the rest. I have been told that some existing MPs are facing deselection, and that this is behind what we are seeing with the Whip sacked and Ferris defying the co-leaders.

This was some weeks before the infighting went public. My reliable sources were indeed reliable.

The latest is:

Te Pāti Māori president John Tamihere is suggesting two of the party’s MPs should resign as he accuses them of “greed, avarice and entitlement”.

In a social media post this afternoon, Tamihere names Te Tai Tokerau MP Mariameno Kapa-Kingi and Te Tai Tonga MP Tākuta Ferris as seeking to challenge for the party’s leadership.

This is something that is called democracy in most parties. However TPM is different in that they have four leadership positions – two co-leaders, the president and the general manager. Three of those four are held by Tamihere family members – Tamihere, his daughter and his son-in-law.

He urges them to do the “honourable thing”, which he likens to Hone Harawira’s 2011 split from the Māori Party.

“I guarantee Kapa-Kingi and Ferris will not do the same thing because their conduct is not based on mana, is not based on integrity and honesty or on principle. Their conduct is based on greed, avarice and entitlement.”

This from the guys whose charitable senior management team get an average salary of $500,000!!

I remind people yet agains that every single poll since the election has shown the only way Chris Hipkins could form Government is with the support of Te Pati Maori.

David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

David, absolutely fantastic. Shame this isn't election year. Of course the left nutcase will try and sweep this under the carpet. I hope this costs them the election. What a train wreck the left are.
They don't even seem embarrassed by the far lefts tpm behavior. Shows just how far down the sewer they actually are.....

ihcpcoro said...

Encouraging to see Tamihere taking the moral high ground.
Maybe he's finally got religion, and will no doubt donate all his worldly posssessions to a higher cause as well.
Yep yep.

Anonymous said...

Oh fight on folks - democracy won't suffer without you - racking my brains to think whether these useless folk have contributed anything towards the good governance of New Zealand.

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