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Opinion: The sudden death of Kiingi Tūheitia last week has sparked an outpouring of sadness and sympathy to be expected on such an occasion. There have been many positive tributes to this quiet and apparently self-effacing man for his service, accompanied by all the traditional pomp and pageantry.
Yet when he became Kiingi in 2006, expectations of how he might perform were at best mixed. Though he was the eldest son of the late Arikinui, Dame Te Atairangikaahu, he had not been assumed to be her automatic successor and was little-known to the public. Moreover, after Dame Te Ata’s 40-year reign, there was understandable apprehension of what might be under a new monarch.
During her reign, the Kiingitanga had recovered a significant amount of the mana that had been lost during the often-fractious reign of her father, Kiingi Korokī, from 1933 to 1966. Although he had battled constantly to maintain the dignity and mana of the Kiingitanga, he had been hampered by ill health, and had largely withdrawn from public life from the late 1950s until his death.
However, under the charismatic Arikinui Dame Te Ata, the Kiingitanga had been revitalised and acknowledged afresh as a significant voice within Māoridom. Dame Te Ata became a widely respected national and international figure. But her death in 2006 raised questions about whether the momentum she had established during her reign would be maintained.
Kiingi Tūheitia’s accession coincided with new challenges for Māori after the passage of the original Foreshore and Seabed Act in 2004 and the rise of the new Māori political party.
If maintaining the momentum and legacy of Dame Te Ata was not a sufficiently daunting prospect, then also having to deal with the new political dynamic made the novice Kiingi’s task potentially overwhelming.
Over the past 18 years, Kiingi Tūheitia proved more than able to put his own, quietly determined stamp on the role and to enhance the mana of the Kiingitanga in the process.
This was at a time when there remained lingering tensions over the 2004 Foreshore and Seabed legislation, and when shallow populist and ideological right-wing politicians were ramping up their criticisms of the contemporary role and place of the Treaty of Waitangi.
Though some were urging a more aggressive response to these tensions, Kiingi Tūheitia remained conciliatory, calling on Māori to maintain their dignity and their unity of purpose.
For the first time, the Kiingi established a special advisory council (Tekau-mā-Rua) and a separate spiritual council (Te Kāhui Wairua) to advise and assist him in his role. He sought to broaden the scope of the Kiingitanga by including representatives from outside the Tainui tribal area.
After the coalition Government came to power in 2023, Kiingi Tūheitia called a national hui in response to the concerns being expressed within the Kiingitanga that the Government’s policies towards Māori could reverse “decades of hard-fought justice”. He set out clearly his views to the hui that “the best protest we can do right now is be Māori, be who we are, live our values, speak our reo, care for our mokopuna”.
He repeated this theme at the Koroneihana, held just days before his death to celebrate the 18th anniversary of his coronation. In what were to be his last public remarks, he said: “Our kotahitanga shouldn’t be focused on fighting against the Government. Instead, we need to focus on getting in the waka and working together. Mana motuhake has room for everyone!”
Speaking after Kiingi Tūheitia’s death, a clearly emotional Prime Minister Christopher Luxon paid a moving tribute, observing that “Kiingi Tūheitia was a humble leader, and it was through that personal humility that he held his influence.”
The upshot has been that through the efforts of Dame Te Ata and Kiingi Tūheitia, the Kiingitanga is now much more influential and widely respected than before, both within Māoridom and across Aotearoa generally.
But, as with all monarchies, the ongoing challenge will be for the institution to remain relevant to the circumstances of its time. There can be no more obvious current example than the struggles King Charles is having, trying to modernise the British monarchy to bring it somewhere nearer to the realities of life in the 21st century.
After the Kiingi’s tangi, therefore, the focus will shift to his successor and the style and tone they will bring to the role. The legacies of Arikinui Dame Te Ata and Kiingi Tūheitia will clearly be important influences, but because things are never static, the focus and style of the new monarch will prove just as critical in shaping the future direction of the Kīngitanga. Waikato-Tainui’s executive arm Te Arataura has already acknowledged that choosing a new leader has come at an important and challenging time for Māoridom.
On Thursday, Tūheitia’s daughter Ngā Wai Hono i te Po was named his successor.
Kiingi Tūheitia has left a strong marker of a Kiingitanga built on promoting a confident Māori identity, that is willing to engage politically, although not necessarily on a partisan basis, to bring people together. But what happens during the debate on Act’s Treaty Principles Bill, and more importantly after its inevitable rejection by Parliament sometime next year, will potentially strain the constructive relationship with the Government that Kiingi Tūheitia sought, and become an early test of the leadership of his successor.
When the Kiingitanga was established in 1858, its aim was to provide a unified national voice for Māori. Differences between tribes over the years have meant it has never quite achieved that ambition.
Now, the unusual combination of the steps taken by Arikinui Dame Te Ata and Kiingi Tūheitia, alongside the perceived challenges posed by the Government’s policy approach, provide an opportunity for the Kīngitanga to achieve the objective for Māoridom that Pōtatau Te Wherowhero’s supporters envisaged when they nominated him as the first Māori King 166 years ago.
The next few months will provide an indication of whether today’s circumstances enable and empower his contemporary successor to turn that opportunity into reality.