The haka shaking New Zealand rugby

How the Hurricane Poua are stirring anticolonial spirit through rugby

There is a steady controversy brewing in my beloved game of rugby. It is a sport that has always been political, like every other sport on this planet, so to see this is both encouraging and unsurprising. And we are being reminded of that fact by the Hurricanes Poua team in Aotearoa. The only people it seems to surprise are the white men who always shout “no politics in sport” as if structures of oppression and inequality do not find a central footing within the realm of sport. When Nelson Mandela handed Francois Pienaar the trophy, wearing the green and gold of the Springboks in 1995, it was meant to usher in a new age of sports and politics. The moment that supposedly transcended race, while the old apartheid flag was being waved proudly by white nationalists in the crowd. But sports, and rugby especially, is always political.

The Hurrianes Poua, Wellington Aotearoa’s biggest professional women’s rugby union team has performed an amended haka in their opening game of the super rugby season against the Chiefs Manawa. The amendment of the haka included a line taking direct fight to the center right coalition government of New Zealand who are being accused of breaching the Te Tiriti o Waitangi (The Treaty of Waitangi). The treaty was an agreement between the indigenous peoples of Aoetearoa and the settler colonialists of Europe who were continuing to flock to the islands. To read more about the details of this very incomplete but still extremely important founding document, you can go here to see its history and summary.

The added line, "karetao o te Kāwana kakiwhero" or "puppets of this redneck government" in english, comes as a direct criticism of the center right inclination to bend the knee to colonial policy and forego any and all responsibility to the treaties agreed upon with the indigenous peoples of Aotearoa. In this age of imperial expansion and the unending violence of colonialism, liberalism, capitalist reform, and ultimately white supremacy across the planet, seeing the people of Aotearoa continue their ancestral anticolonial and antiapartheid work is a constant source of inspiration. The women performing this haka were launching a public critique, and though they might be forced to apologise or be fined, their resiliance and their tenacity are an incredible marker of the work that is required in building solidarity.

The people indigenous to the region of Aotearoa have a long standing history of anticolonial work. And as a South African, our Maori elders have a long standing history of direct action against apartheid South Africa. It is a proud tradition that is being upheld by the women of the Hurricanes Poua, and regardless of what comes in the next few days, they are to be admired for their effort. I thank you, deeply.