NZ's youngest MP DIDN'T WANT MY IWI TO MISS OUT

Newly elected politician Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke reveals her road to the Beehive and explains how she’s just going to be me’

- Kasia Jillings

I had probably the best. childhood ever. For the first 11 years, I lived on the North Shore of Tamaki Makaurau [Auckland] with my mum and grandmother, and commuted to Rāhui Pōkeka [Huntly] on weekends to my dad.

My parents separated before I was born, but their co-parenting skills are amazing.

My grandmother and mother are such hard, staunch women, and nothing passed by them if they didn't like it.

My mum was one of the first Māori at a very young age to work at the Auckland Museum looking after the taonga [treasures] there.

She's from Te Tai Tokerau [Northland] and I was in my mum's womb when she presented to a judge why a prison shouldn't be built on our sacred Ngawha land, and I was named after the geothermal area. On my father's side there was also activism.

It wasn't overly imposed on me but I was very aware of everything they sacrificed for my little privileged self to have all of this, so I have always had on my mind, 'What are you going to do to give back?" For my school years, I was waitlisted for kohanga reo and kura kaupapa [Māori immersion daycare and primary school], so I went to mainstream primary school.

Then when I was 11, I decided to move down to Rāhui Pōkeka to go to wharekura [immersion high school] because I knew it was now or never.

I was always jealous of cousins and siblings going to wharekura and as much as I loved my mum, I wanted to move to my whenua [land].

I really think mainstream is another great avenue for our kids, but for me, the wharekura education system just fit like a glove and I really started to unlock my identity.

It was a whole other world I had been longing for and craving for so long.