Is she on drugs? Turning a destructive fire into a spiritual endorsement for land transfer is the kind of magical thinking that belongs on the fringes, not in Parliament. It reflects how deeply Te Pāti Māori has drifted from everyday New Zealanders and the realities of governing a modern country. At this stage they should just join up with the Greens, they’re just as delusional.
Suggesting that natural disasters carry political messages invites chaos, not leadership. It treats mythology as a substitute for science and ideology as a replacement for law. If every storm, quake or eruption is reimagined as ancestral commentary, then facts no longer matter, only mumbo jumbo faith does.
A Member of Parliament should be grounded in reason, not ritual. This sort of rhetoric shows Te Pāti Māori doubling down on grievance politics, turning heritage into a weapon rather than a bridge.
Tongariro National Park was gifted to the nation - all of it. It stands as one of New Zealand’s few truly shared treasures. To now demand it back for a select few is not justice, it’s revisionism. The generosity of that original gift is being rewritten as a mistake, its symbolism twisted into a call for exclusion.
And for what? There’s no plan, no policy, no explanation of how a “return” would work. Who governs it? Who funds it? Do ordinary New Zealanders lose access? The silence is deafening.
Kaipara’s appeal to tikanga and whakapapa might impress other racist Māori, but to the wider public it looks like mysticism dressed up as moral authority. Tikanga is supposed to be about balance and respect. Instead, it’s being used as cover for divisive politics that pit Māori against everyone else - it’s mumbo jumbo.
Te Pāti Māori likes to talk about mana and mauri, but not much about mortgages or medical waiting lists. Ordinary people are struggling with costs, housing and education. Meanwhile, its MPs are busy interpreting wildfires as spiritual telegrams - what a whākn’ joke.
New Zealanders want fairness, not fables. They want competence, not cosmic messaging. They want a government that looks forward, not one forever chasing symbolic battles over land already held in trust for everyone.
The fire on Tongariro was not a message from the ancestors. It was a warning from reality. When politicians abandon reason for ideology, and turn faith into policy, the country burns in more ways than one.
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.
7 comments:
Everyone loves an Indian Giver. Can I have that back now.
Matua, have you not learnt by now that these people are not stupid? They say shit like this because it works! The real retards are the people who fall for it who, sadly, are the ones running this country.
Matua Kahurangi nailed it. While most New Zealanders saw the Tongariro fire as an ecological disaster, Te partly Maori MP Oriini Kaipara saw a message from the dead — the late paramount chief Sir Tumu Te Heuheu Tūkino VIII — urging that the land be “returned” to iwi. “It was gifted in good faith. It’s time to give it back,” she posted.
And what did our mainstream journalists do? Exactly what you’d expect in the age of Instagram reporting: they typed out her post, sprinkled in a few words of admiration for her whakapapa, and hit publish. But Nz herald’s rachel Maher goes further: she distracts, projects, and deflects, burying Kaipara’s claim under a long, wiki-inspired dissertation on Sir Tumu — his leadership roles, heritage work, environmental protection, and iwi credentials. The story ends up framed as culturally authentic storytelling rather than as extraordinary political claims requiring scrutiny.
Instead of asking the obvious questions — what policy, what plan, what mandate — Maher steers readers into lineage and ceremonial history, giving Kaipara a free pass. Projection and deflection, all dressed up as context. The public is left digesting ideology masquerading as insight.
The irony is richer still. Kaipara, a former tv talking head. recently delivered an extended first speech in Parliament — complete with what a strenuous but staged haka finale.
The public is now told she needs “rest” as TMP engages in civil war. All funded by taxpayers, naturally. It’s hard to imagine anyone else getting a sanctioned recovery period after a speech, yet here we are.
Kahurangi cuts through the mumbo jumbo. Tongariro was gifted to the nation. It is a shared treasure. Wildfires are not cosmic telegrams. Invoking spirits as policy guidance is absurd and unfit for parliamentary discourse. Yet Maher and others treat it as newsworthy moral theatre, not dangerous magical thinking.
The takeaway is simple: New Zealand journalism has a duty to interrogate, not amplify. MPs like Kaipara must be accountable for the ideas they float — particularly when those ideas involve land, taxpayer money, and national symbols. Taking a timeout with no justification and getting a free pass from media scrutiny is not unacceptable.
Matua Kahurangi shows how it should be done. Facts first. Consequences considered. Ideology and myth interrogated, not celebrated. If journalists followed that standard, the public might start to get the Parliament it actually pays for — not a stage for Instagram sermons.
—PB
If I was Te Heu Heu''s ghost I would be most offended by the wealthy designer dressed throngs at the ski tows in season. I would not counter them by burning near deserted scrubland at the base. It is equally likely the fire wa started by a fag end tossed by one of te Heu Heu's descendants, disproportionately hoked on smoking.
It’s moments like this I’m really glad we’ve got a solid centre-right government with a decisive leader who doesn’t entertain separatism and that we successfully passed and enacted the treaty principals bill and abolished the Maori seats in parliament.
Would not asking for something back that was given (and presumably received) in good faith, be the opposite of good faith? Is this an admission from inside the ranks of separatist radicals that they are bad faith actors? Sure looks that way.
What mesage would the Maori gods be giving if / when Tongariro starts smoking and erupting ??
And to think that none of this area ever burnt previously during pyroclastic flows from any of these volcanoes !
Do they really try and tell University level students that this is matauranga science to be believed more credibly than the universally accepted volcanolgy courses ?
What idiots we have in the media who make a headline and publish this crap.
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