Te Pāti Māori MP Tākuta Ferris let loose another racially charged outburst this week. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Te Pāti Māori has met with an anti-racism group as the party figures out how to best respond to the latest racially charged outburst from its MP Tākuta Ferris.
Ferris defied his co-leaders this week when he doubled down on comments about minority communities his party had already apologised for.
People's Action Plan Against Racism in Aotearoa criticised Ferris' comments in a detailed response published yesterday.
The working group said the Tai Tonga MP was wrong to suggest tauiwi (non-Māori) communities couldn't support general party campaigns in Māori electorates.
It also said suggestions these communities posed a threat to Māori was not only factually incorrect, but compounded the racialised harm these communities already experienced.
"Casting fellow minoritised groups as adversaries for exercising standard democratic participation constitutes lateral racism and makes solidarity work harder, at a time when it is most crucial," the responds read.
Lead advisor Tina Ngata told RNZ the working group had now met with Te Pāti Māori and that the party had been "very open" to its feedback.
Te Pāti Māori's leadership has gone to ground after Ferris' latest outburst and is understood to still be working through how to respond to its MP and what to say to its supporters.
It was likely the party would use social media platforms like Instagram or Facebook to speak to its support base when it had something to say, not traditional media outlets.
Co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer took over Mariameno Kapa-Kingi as the party's whip this week, though a party spokesperson said the change was made to faciliate the onboarding of new MP Orrini Kaipara and "completely unrelated" to Ferris' comments.
Ferris' comments 'absolutely unacceptable' - anti-racism group
People's Action Plan Against Racism in Aotearoa lead advisor Tina Ngata. Photo: Supplied / Tina Ngata
Ferris criticised Labour for having "Indians, Asians, Black and Pakeha" campaigning for its candidate Peeni Henare in the Tāmaki Makaurau by-election last week.
He went further in an Instagram video on Tuesday night, asking people to call out minority communities for "trying to make [Māori] disappear" and to make them feel uncomfortable.
Ngata said the comments invited "racialised surveillance" and harassment of minority groups.
"We as Māori actually should be very sensitive to what it's like to be surveilled and harassed and so it's absolutely unacceptable to invite other people to do that."
She said Ferris' claim minority groups supporting Henare's run for the Tāmaki Makaurau seat "homogenises Māori" wasn't okay.
"He's making assumptions based on an appearance of people, which is problematic, but then also when you start to infer or suggest some form of ill intent about people based on your racial assumptions about them, that starts to wade into the area of racial profiling.
"We don't know what the intention of the people are in that photo. It's fair to say that they may believe that they're acting in solidarity. He can debate that but that doesn't necessarily make that the truth."
Ngata said Ferris' framing was harmful in any language, including te reo Māori.
"He's contested the issue is really about a colonial hangover that makes people uncomfortable with naming other groups when you use it in English and that it would be more permissible if it was in te reo Māori, but actually it wouldn't.
"And in fact, the te reo Māori translation that he's given is not that accurate. We don't consider it to be an accurate translation in that sense as well. It's not really a problem of language, it's a problem of framing."
The working group made it clear in its response that while it criticised Ferris' commentary, it also had wider concerns about racism in politics.
"We have seen, in nearly every electoral cycle, the pattern of racism against both Māori and racially minoritised tauiwi communities. Māori rights and Tiriti justice are framed as dangerous and exclusive, whilst minoritised tauiwi communities are framed as a threat to national identity and stability.
"These themes are often escalated through poor reporting in media and weaponised in ways that obscure the real drivers of harm across all of our communities: colonial racism."
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