A history of Te Hui Oranga o Te Moana Nui a Kiwa

In 1982, Te Hui Oranga o te Moana nui a Kiwa brought the struggle for a Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific home to Aotearoa. At Tātai Hono Marae in Tāmaki Makaurau, Māori gathered alongside Pacific diaspora and Pākehā communities to hear directly from those living under nuclear colonialism. Their guests in 1982 were from Ma’ohi Nui, the Philippines, and Australia, joined in future years by those from Hawaiʻi, Fiji, Great Turtle Island, Kanaky, and Belau. From them, Māori learnt about a nuclear cycle of dispossession and pollution: where fuel was mined on Aboriginal country, milled on Native American lands, detonated as weapons on Pacific Islands, and dumped as waste in the moana. They heeded warnings about the harmful effects of ionising radiation on women and the unborn. They heard how militarism was driving the further theft of land and ocean. In turn, Māori shared their own stories, explaining how tangata whenua were too often landless, culturally dispossessed, and underserved by ruling elites. That they too had suffered through colonisation, felt its wars and diseases, had their hospitality repaid with broken promises, conversion, and assimilation. Seen in this way, the nuclear bomb was just the latest colonial tool: ‘tekanology’ designed to destroy life and maintain oppression. Together with their guests and these new understandings, Māori strengthened their resistance.

The strategy informing Te Hui Oranga was straightforward and aligned with the broader Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific movement. By inviting Pacific activists to Aotearoa, Māori contributed to a grassroots network that would advance political independence throughout the Pacific, thereby denying nuclear powers access to land and water. At the same time, the activists looked to their own Indigenous cultures to build an alternative to nuclear colonialism, revitalising practices that provided for each other, the natural world, and future generations.