Who could be the next Minister for Pacific Peoples?

The only Pacific MP in New Zealand's National Party has signalled her interest in the Pacific peoples portfolio.

Angee Nicholas is teetering on a 30 vote margin in the Te Atatū electorate, depending on special votes. Speaking to RNZ Pacific, Nicholas said which portfolios had caught her eye.

“Maybe Pacific People[s], being the spokesperson for that, because obviously I’m Pacific, but more than that, as part of my journey being a Pacific [person] growing up you see the importance you set our kids up well for the future.”

At 29, Nicholas is new to the political front lines but worked as a staffer for Nikki Kaye when she was the National Party deputy leader, and also has experience as an in-house lawyer at the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care, and is the director of her family’s security company.

Alfred Ngaro was National's last Minister for Pacific Peoples back in 2017, and says this role would usually go to a senior MP, but there could be ways around it.

“Anything’s possible in politics. She’s a very clever person and very capable as well, [but] I don’t think they’d put her in there," he said.

“Shane Reti at the moment holds the Pacific portfolio so they could bring it under him and she could have what they call a secretariat role, which means that it builds that capacity in her to eventually take on a role like that.”

Other contenders could be Fonoti Agnes Loheni who did a stint as National’s associate spokesperson for Pacific Peoples in 2019-2020, but she is currently outside of parliament due to her list placing.

Speaking to Levi Matautia-Morgan on 531pi’s Pacific Mornings, Ngaro says the National party hasn’t made Pacific representation a priority since he was an MP.

“There was Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, myself, Agnes Loheni, we had people that were representing us in there. But I would have thought that there would have been some planning, strategically, to ensure that they were high enough on the list to ensure they could have actually been in.

“Agnes would have been great, I still hope for the future that she may [be].”