#PacificVotesCount
Pacific Climate Warriors
Your playlists are political. The number of working lamps on your street are political. The placement of liquor stores in your area is political. A warm house is political. Access to clean water is political. Your group of friends are political —yup! even the one you just thought about right now.
Our everyday choices are political.
Malo Tagata Pasifika! For the moment, when you think of VoTiNg, I ask that you put aside that image of Parliament, colourful political parties and ALL the great memes, and answer this: Where does politics fit in your life?
The 2020 vs 2019 memes are crack up because they pack a sad truth—2020 has not pulled its punches on anyone. BUT, you have an opportunity to elevate what matters to you this year, for the next four years to come. Voting is one of the most important equalisers in our society. It’s where everyone counts, but only those who vote are counted and are accounted for. This is why it’s crucial that we address our Pasifika people who have amongst the lowest voter turnout rates in the country. We are not being counted and so our voices are not being counted.
That’s not to say we aren’t political or politically interested *cough*the-Polynesian-Panthers-and-their-entire-legacythat-NZ-has-benefitted-and-are-still-benefiting-from *cough*. The whole system of voting can feel foreign because the reality is our closest interactions, cultural identity are governed by leaders within our homes and our families. The origins of the governmental structure here in Aotearoa were not founded on Pasifika values and systems of governance. For some of us, this may even be the first time we’ve been asked by our government ‘what do YOU care about?’.
To vote is to use your agency to be heard in this way AND it legitimises all other avenues of advocating for change. In the reimagining and bringing-home of ‘voting’, think of the voting system as a waka, va’a, vaka etc… Each vote is a paddle. Each vote is an ocean’s current that guides the vaka. Each vote is the altering of the Hoe uli (the steering paddle or sweep) in which even small but continuous adjustments to its position can be the difference between arriving in Fiji and not Samoa (685 to the oti). Each vote is a step closer to the direction of your future. Where are you navigating yourself? Where are you guiding all that is on board your vaka to? Your vote matters and has the power to turn tides.
To be Pasifika is to be Powerful.
To be Pasifika is to be Purposeful.
To be Pasifika is to be Political.
To not “act” Pasifika, not “sound Pasifika’, not “look” Pasifika but still be Pasifika, is to be Political.
To navigate Aotearoa is to be Political.
Our ancestors CHOSE to leave behind the comfort of familiarity, to seek a better life and greater opportunities.
They CHOSE this land for their children and their children’s children to call home.
They CHOSE to contribute to this country, even when this country blinded itself to their contributions.
They CHOSE to stay and resist for the dream that their children will be equipped for this society. Their guidance and their working of their Hoe uli on their waka navigating through a literal and metaphorical ocean of change resulted in you. It is a great reminder as well, that we shouldn’t vote for our ancestors, we should vote because of them. We should vote as the ancestors we are and will be.
The 2020 New Zealand General Election is coming up—and this is our time to make sure we take every chance we get to have our say and make #PacificVotesCount. The Elections can be daunting, boring, or straight confusing—but we have a great opportunity now to come together and hold our country accountable in the most direct ways we can.
I’ll bet my student loan that there’s someone who feels the same way as you do about politics, registering to vote, or even deciding who to vote for.
If you haven’t found them yet, maybe you will on @pacificvotescount. Check us out! (because I need my student loan).