This article was first published on RNZ.
On a misty spring morning at Tuurangawaewae Marae a year ago, cars neatly parked in rows filled the nearby sports field, and dew blanketed the grass.
Thousands had traveled to Ngaaruawaahia in Waikato to farewell the late Māori King, Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau te Wherowhero VII, and to witness the naming of the next head of the Māori monarchy.
In the moments before Te Whakawahinga, the ceremony to announce the Kiingi’s successor, the crowd was hushed with anticipation.
Large screens were set up across the grounds of Tuurangawaewae to broadcast the moment.
Then the sounds of pūtātara, haka, and karanga filled the marae ātea, as Te Arikinui Kuini Nga wai hono i te po, the king’s only daughter and youngest child, walked through the ornately carved red gates.
A 27-year-old wahine Māori was taking up the mantle.
The crowd was overwhelmed with emotion, particularly young girls and their mothers, their eyes welling up with tears.
This week, the Kiingitanga will commemorate one year since that day. Koroneihana is an annual week-long celebration of the Māori monarch, and attracts iwi and politicians from across the motu to Tuurangawaewae.
Far from the history-steeped grounds of Tuurangawaewae, upstairs and down long halls at AUT’s Auckland city campus, you’ll find the ‘whānau room’, a space for Māori students to study, kōrero, and just be Māori with each other.
It’s lunchtime, and students are pouring into the furniture-stuffed room.
Music plays from a large speaker, and a trolley laden with steaming metal trays of chicken, a large pot of mashed potatoes, and platters of salads and roasted veggies is wheeled in.
For many students, this weekly gathering is the only time they get to unwind between their busy schedules of lectures, tutorials, and assignments.
We’ve come to ask them what the Kiingitanga, and te Kuini Māori, means to them as rangatahi.
Many of the tauira are hesitant to speak: they don’t want to say the wrong thing or feel whakamā.
Alyssa, a first-year student, is the first to share her whakaaro.
She was there when Te Arikinui Kuini Nga wai hono i te po was announced as the new head of the Kiingitanga, attending the King’s tangi with her school.
“That moment when she came out, I was standing in the crowd, and she was coming up the walkway. Everybody was like, ‘Who is it? Who’s it gonna be?’ And then the moment that we all realised, ‘Oh my gosh, it’s her’.
“It was just that moment of power.”
Te Arikinui Kuini Nga wai hono i te po is the eighth Māori monarch and only the second woman to hold the position, following in the footsteps of her grandmother, Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu, who died in 2006.
Alyssa says that’s part of what makes her so inspiring.
“Having a woman in that position, where she can actually make a difference, and she has that perspective of being wahine Māori … I just think that’s so important.”
Maia Staples-Fletcher (Ngāti Tuwharetoa, Ngāti Kahu), a second-year design student, agreed.
“She’s a reminder that we wāhine Māori have the power. We have the mana to do whatever you want.”
Te Arikinui Kuini Nga wai hono i te po is also the second-youngest Māori monarch ever appointed.
Noah Singe, an uri (descendant) of Waikato, said the Queen’s age “really resonates with the younger generation”.
He said that this connection was especially strong among the ‘kōhanga generation’, due to the way she “holds her reo and her pride with her culture”.
In her first year, while still grieving her father, the Māori Queen had been a visible presence at key events across te ao Māori.
She attended Waitangi commemorations in Northland, visited Rātana Pā, and travelled to Nelson, where she was gifted a whale jawbone, a taonga that brought her to tears.
In October 2024, she walked alongside thousands during the national Hīkoi mō te Tiriti to Parliament in Wellington.
Singe said that moment stood out to many young Māori.
“I think that was a really significant action for her to get out there and be te Kuini of the people. Showing face, being out there, standing up for the kaupapa and not just sitting in an office at the back of a whare somewhere,” he said.
“It’s really good to get our leaders out there and amongst it just to show that integrity and that support for the wider Māori communities.”
Hera Watene (Tainui, Ngāti Rangi), a communications student, praised the Queen’s participation in the Hīkoi mō te Tiriti.
“Having seen her at the Toitū Te Tiriti protests, that just emphasises that whakaaro of us, that Māori are upset by this.”
Almost all the students expressed concern that being authentically Māori is under attack.
“I think at the moment, one of the main issues facing rangatahi is staying strong, especially within this political climate.
“It’s important that the Kiingitanga is there providing that service to help our younger generation uplift themselves,” Singe said.
Spaces like the whānau room at AUT have come under fire from the ACT Party, which argued that areas dedicated to Māori and Pasifika University students at universities were a form of ‘segregation’.
Staples-Fletcher said that was having a real impact on morale.
“They were really trying to take away Māori support systems in tertiary education,” she said.
“That’s a raru [problem] that we are facing collectively as tertiary students, is the thought that all of our Māori support systems might get taken away from us.”
The rangatahi see opportunity in having a younger monarch with potential for a long reign, with time to see through her vision and ideas.
The Kiingitanga was established in 1858 to unite all iwi under the leadership of Pootatau Te Wherowhero. It aimed to cease the sale of land to Pākehā, stop inter-tribal warfare, and to protect Māori culture in the face of colonisation.
Nearly 170 years later, much had changed, but the Kiingitanga had continued to step up, Singe said.
“Our past king … called up Hui-aa-motu, and started those movements and really pushed that [unity] movement.”
The Kiingitanga remained an important platform for Māori to express their needs and wishes, Singe said.
“In terms of rangatahi, it’s a platform for them to interact with, to get their voices heard.”
Watene said if anyone doubted the relevance of the Kiingatanga, they only needed to look at the turnout at the King’s tangi last year.
“That was so important for us as rangatahi. We got to see history coming forward, and it may have been really mamae, but that’s so important to be there. I felt the wairua.”
By Ella Stewart of RNZ.
