‘Have some decorum’: Pamatatau urges Greens to address cultural safety

“Growing pains” is how a former member of the Greens and political commentator and writer has described the party’s current dilemma.

Richard Pamatatau questioned the cultural capacity within the Greens’ camp following the resignation of three senior Pasifika Party members over the treatment of Darlene Tana.

Tana was urged by the party to resign from Parliament following an independent review into allegations linking her to exploitations at her husband’s bicycle company.

The Greens had their annual conference in Christchurch last weekend which saw the party’s Pasifika secretary and Dunedin City Councillor Marie Laufiso resign.

Joining Laufiso were senior Pasifika Greens members Alofa Aiono, who is married to former MP Elizabeth Kerekere, and Vasemaca Tavola.

Pamatatau, who was a member of the party for a year, told William Terite on Pacific Mornings that he had been aware of the Greens’ lack of understanding to meet the needs and expectations of Pasifika members.

“The Greens, while very well intended around climate and the planet, also are seen in some ways as a very Anglo or Eurocentric party in their approach to things.

“And I would argue possibly this is what is happening there. And people like Marie Laufiso, Alofa Aiono and Vasemaca Tavola are very smart people. They're not people who would make a decision just because they were annoyed.

“They're obviously sending a signal that something has to change, something has to happen. And the fact that they've talked about feeling culturally unsafe speaks to that.

“And that is something that the Greens are going to have to deal with, that whole idea of cultural safety.”

Pamatatau said he wrote about similar problems within the party when it came to reaching out to a different population.

“One of the older white ladies said, ‘how do we get the Asians to vote for us?’

“Not ‘how do we get an Asian population to vote for us’, but ‘how do we get the Asians’, and actually maybe ‘they're not the sort of people we should have voting for us’. And I think her language was problematic.”

With an eventful year so far for the Greens, Pamatatau said the party needed some decorum.

“One of the co-leaders, Chloe, spoke and said she wants the Greens to be the biggest leftist party in Parliament at the next election.

“If the Greens cannot get and cannot manage the behaviour of members, if it cannot be culturally safe and respectful to senior people from the Pacific population, that is not going to happen.”