In The Post, you can read how Davey Salmon, KC, explained the political process that resulted in the Māori Party dumping two of its MPs – “to make a big omelette you have to crack a lot of eggs”.
Salmon was in the High Court yesterday acting for party president John Tamihere and the party’s “National Council”.
If then you turn to Facebook, you might have your ideas about the Māori Party thoroughly scrambled by the Socialist Equality Group.
On its Facebook page, the group disparagingly gripes:
The sordid spectacle of a fight for influence among members of the Māori bourgeoisie has once again exposed the fraud perpetrated by the middle class pseudo-lefts—as well as “liberal” publications like the Daily Blog and the BHN podcast—which portray Te Pāti Māori’s divisive racial identity politics as progressive.
The Socialist Equality Group is a Trotskyist organisation aligned with the International Committee of the Fourth International .
It advocates for revolutionary socialism and opposes capitalism and imperialist wars.
It also calls for workers to form independent rank‑and‑file committees outside traditional unions and parties.
As anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-war, the SEG rejects the reformist approaches of mainstream parties like Labour and the Greens.
Hmm. What else does it have to say about the Māori Party?
Plenty. We found it on the Scoop website in a press release headed On The Chaos In The Māori Party.
The press release – more like an article – backgrounds the Māori Party’s differences and the bitter internal power struggle, which may well result in a split.
It notes the expulsion of MPs Mariameno Kapa-Kingi and Tākuta Ferris and how each faction is accusing the other of bullying and toxic behaviour, but laments that
… no one in the party has expressed any differences over TPM’s right-wing political program. The party represents indigenous capitalists and promotes divisive racialist identity politics. Its main demands are for increased payments from the state, through the Treaty of Waitangi settlements process, to benefit tribal-based businesses, and for more political power to be given to the tribal elites.
TPM has worked with both the major parties of big business to achieve these aims. At present, it is positioned to support the opposition Labour Party in next year’s election, but from 2008 to 2017 the Māori Party was part of a coalition government led by the conservative National Party.
Because of its right-wing record, the SEG says, the Māori Party has no mass support among Māori workers, who are one of the most impoverished sections of the working class.
The party got just 3 percent in the 2023 election, whereas Māori are more than 15 percent of the total population.
The SEG then rails against efforts to split workers on the basis of race:
Various liberal commentators and middle class, pseudo-left groups have sought to boost TPM as an ally of the Labour Party and as a mechanism to divide workers along racial lines
As the National Party-led coalition government carries out vicious austerity measures, workers of all races and backgrounds are seeking to fight back, as seen in the mass public sector strike on October 23.
The established parties, including Labour and its allies, want to prevent any unified mass movement that could threaten the capitalist system itself. The chaos that has engulfed TPM, however, poses a serious threat to its usefulness.
The SEG article cites Ferris’ “blatantly racist social media post attacking the Labour Party’s multi-ethnic campaign team during the by-election held in the Tāmaki Makaurau electorate” as an early sign of inner-party divisions,
Party co-leaders Tama Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer had apologised for the post, which undercut the Maori Party’s alliance with Labour, but Ferris refused to apologise.
Ngarewa-Packer told the media on November 10 that “part of why the decision had to be made” to expel Ferris and Kapa-Kingi was to “repair” TPM’s relations with non-Māori and “to have an Aotearoa [NZ] that is inclusive of everyone.” Waititi insisted that the party was having “positive and constructive” discussions with the Greens and Labour about how to defeat the government.
Asked whether he could form a coalition with TPM, however, Labour leader Chris Hipkins sought to distance himself from the party, telling the media on November 24 that it was “unclear whether there is even a Māori Party left or whether there are multiple different factions now doing their own thing.” He criticised TPM for being too focused on identity politics, saying “identity alone is not enough.”
The SEG denounces this as “thoroughly hypocritical”:
“The 2017–2023 Labour Party-led government was relentless in stoking gender and racial identity politics, even as it oversaw surging social inequality, increased homelessness and poverty, with working-class Māori among the worst-affected. Labour sought to forge alliances with the Māori tribal leadership through the “co-governance” of water resources, by promoting separate “by Māori, for Māori” healthcare services, and by guaranteeing that at least 5 percent of government procurement contracts were awarded to Māori-run businesses.
The role of Māori Party president John Tamihere inevitably comes into SEG considerations – attention is drawn to an article on November 20 by political commentator and academic Bryce Edwards.
Tamihere is both the Māori Party’s president and “the highly-paid chief executive of the Waipareira Trust”, which runs numerous social welfare, health and education services that have been privatised under the Whānau Ora scheme—a product of the 2008–2017 National Party government’s alliance with the Māori Party.
According to Edwards, the Waipareira Trust has net assets worth more than $104 million and over $75 million in cash reserves, a 24 percent profit margin and senior executive remuneration averaging $511,000. The trust has loaned and donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Te Pāti Māori’s campaigns.
On its Facebook page, the group disparagingly gripes:
The sordid spectacle of a fight for influence among members of the Māori bourgeoisie has once again exposed the fraud perpetrated by the middle class pseudo-lefts—as well as “liberal” publications like the Daily Blog and the BHN podcast—which portray Te Pāti Māori’s divisive racial identity politics as progressive.
The Socialist Equality Group is a Trotskyist organisation aligned with the International Committee of the Fourth International .
It advocates for revolutionary socialism and opposes capitalism and imperialist wars.
It also calls for workers to form independent rank‑and‑file committees outside traditional unions and parties.
As anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-war, the SEG rejects the reformist approaches of mainstream parties like Labour and the Greens.
Hmm. What else does it have to say about the Māori Party?
Plenty. We found it on the Scoop website in a press release headed On The Chaos In The Māori Party.
The press release – more like an article – backgrounds the Māori Party’s differences and the bitter internal power struggle, which may well result in a split.
It notes the expulsion of MPs Mariameno Kapa-Kingi and Tākuta Ferris and how each faction is accusing the other of bullying and toxic behaviour, but laments that
… no one in the party has expressed any differences over TPM’s right-wing political program. The party represents indigenous capitalists and promotes divisive racialist identity politics. Its main demands are for increased payments from the state, through the Treaty of Waitangi settlements process, to benefit tribal-based businesses, and for more political power to be given to the tribal elites.
TPM has worked with both the major parties of big business to achieve these aims. At present, it is positioned to support the opposition Labour Party in next year’s election, but from 2008 to 2017 the Māori Party was part of a coalition government led by the conservative National Party.
Because of its right-wing record, the SEG says, the Māori Party has no mass support among Māori workers, who are one of the most impoverished sections of the working class.
The party got just 3 percent in the 2023 election, whereas Māori are more than 15 percent of the total population.
The SEG then rails against efforts to split workers on the basis of race:
Various liberal commentators and middle class, pseudo-left groups have sought to boost TPM as an ally of the Labour Party and as a mechanism to divide workers along racial lines
As the National Party-led coalition government carries out vicious austerity measures, workers of all races and backgrounds are seeking to fight back, as seen in the mass public sector strike on October 23.
The established parties, including Labour and its allies, want to prevent any unified mass movement that could threaten the capitalist system itself. The chaos that has engulfed TPM, however, poses a serious threat to its usefulness.
The SEG article cites Ferris’ “blatantly racist social media post attacking the Labour Party’s multi-ethnic campaign team during the by-election held in the Tāmaki Makaurau electorate” as an early sign of inner-party divisions,
Party co-leaders Tama Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer had apologised for the post, which undercut the Maori Party’s alliance with Labour, but Ferris refused to apologise.
Ngarewa-Packer told the media on November 10 that “part of why the decision had to be made” to expel Ferris and Kapa-Kingi was to “repair” TPM’s relations with non-Māori and “to have an Aotearoa [NZ] that is inclusive of everyone.” Waititi insisted that the party was having “positive and constructive” discussions with the Greens and Labour about how to defeat the government.
Asked whether he could form a coalition with TPM, however, Labour leader Chris Hipkins sought to distance himself from the party, telling the media on November 24 that it was “unclear whether there is even a Māori Party left or whether there are multiple different factions now doing their own thing.” He criticised TPM for being too focused on identity politics, saying “identity alone is not enough.”
The SEG denounces this as “thoroughly hypocritical”:
“The 2017–2023 Labour Party-led government was relentless in stoking gender and racial identity politics, even as it oversaw surging social inequality, increased homelessness and poverty, with working-class Māori among the worst-affected. Labour sought to forge alliances with the Māori tribal leadership through the “co-governance” of water resources, by promoting separate “by Māori, for Māori” healthcare services, and by guaranteeing that at least 5 percent of government procurement contracts were awarded to Māori-run businesses.
The role of Māori Party president John Tamihere inevitably comes into SEG considerations – attention is drawn to an article on November 20 by political commentator and academic Bryce Edwards.
Tamihere is both the Māori Party’s president and “the highly-paid chief executive of the Waipareira Trust”, which runs numerous social welfare, health and education services that have been privatised under the Whānau Ora scheme—a product of the 2008–2017 National Party government’s alliance with the Māori Party.
According to Edwards, the Waipareira Trust has net assets worth more than $104 million and over $75 million in cash reserves, a 24 percent profit margin and senior executive remuneration averaging $511,000. The trust has loaned and donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Te Pāti Māori’s campaigns.
“Tamihere has effectively created an indigenous elite class whose interests no longer align with those of the Māori working class,” Edwards wrote. “The rhetoric remains about uplifting whānau [families and communities], but the material outcomes disproportionately benefit those at the top.”
He accused Tamihere of hijacking the party and running it as a “family business,” noting that Tamihere’s daughter is married to the party’s co-leader Waititi. “Parties that want to take on elite power do not purge members who ask questions. They empower them,” Edwards wrote.
But the SEG says Tamihere’s opponents offer no alternative: “they represent similar privileged layers.
Before entering parliament in 2023, Kapa-Kingi had been chief executive of Te Rūnanga Nui o Te Aupōuri Trust, the business arm of the Te Aupōuri tribe.
It’s a plush trust, by the looks of things:
In 2012, the National Party government gave Te Aupōuri a treaty settlement worth $21 million. According to the trust’s draft financial statement for the year ending June 2025, its net assets, including fisheries, forestry and agricultural businesses, have now reached $63 million.
According to Kapa-Kingi, a recent meeting held in her electorate of Te Tai Tokerau called by Te Rūnanga Nui Ā Ngāpuhi, another tribal corporation, supported her call for Tamihere to step down. Ngāpuhi has net assets of $97.1 million.
The tribes, known as iwi, appear to believe that Tamihere has too much personal control over TPM. The powerful Iwi Chairs Forum, representing 88 tribes who together control billions of dollars in business assets, has called publicly for an end to TPM’s infighting and opposed the expulsion of Kapa-Kingi and Ferris.
The SEG article concludes:
The sordid spectacle of a fight for influence among members of the Māori bourgeoisie has once again exposed the fraud perpetrated by the middle class pseudo-lefts—as well as “liberal” publications like the Daily Blog and the BHN podcast—which portray TPM’s divisive racial identity politics as progressive.
Working people confront unprecedented social inequality, homelessness, food insecurity, the collapse of public services, and the integration of New Zealand into US plans for a catastrophic war against China. This historic crisis produced by capitalism will not be resolved by handing more wealth and power to indigenous tribal corporations or to organisations like Tamihere’s Waipareira Trust.
The working class—Māori and non-Māori, immigrants and workers of all countries—must be united on the basis of a socialist program. The system of private profit must be abolished, and the wealth hoarded by the super-rich must be expropriated, placed under the democratic control of the working class, and used to eliminate poverty and social inequality.
There is no race-based separatism in this call for action, nor any demand for Treaty-based privileges.
Refreshing, eh?
The SEG is urging Māori and non-Māori, immigrants and workers of all countries to work together.
Our only beef is that most PoO readers might fear this is a call for political action against them.
Bob Edlin is a veteran journalist and editor for the Point of Order blog HERE. - where this article was sourced.
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