Call for Ki-o-Rahi tolerance

As the Maori handball game, Ki-o-Rahi, continues to gain in popularity in New Zealand, and the dominant NZ sporting organisation, the New Zealand Rugby Football Union, continues to subvert the revival of Ki-o-Rahi, more people are calling for a more measured response to the emergence of this traditional Maori sporting code.

Otago University lecturer Justin Heke has included Ki-o-Rahi into the ‘PHSE 320: Akoranga Whakakori' paper because Ki-o-Rahi needs to be acknowledged and critically examined within the context of our modern society at the highest tertiary level.

Such a forthright view is shared by many other sportspeople, academics and educationalists both Maori and Pakeha.

Black Fern (NZ Women's Representative Rugby Team), and Otago University Ki-o-Rahi player, Claire Richardson has been enthused by the game.

If it is of an educational, physical and social benefit then let it be!

Black Fern captain, Farah Palmer, has also shown an avid interest in the promotion of Ki-o-Rahi and can't see why both games cannot exist compatibly in our society.

There is no harm and only benefits can arise from its [Ki-o-Rahis] increased popularity and adherence.

Ki-o-Rahi has a natural attraction to play makers who prefer fast paced action. Ki-o-Rahi playing has been seen as a benefit by many rugby players because of its high aerobic demands. The Aotearoa Maori Womens Rugby Sevens team, perennial winners of the Hong Kong Sevens, includes Ki-o-Rahi players Annie Brown and Honey Hireme from the Waikato.

Where there is smoke, there is fire, and Ki-o-Rahi is creating all the heat on the sports scene at the moment - it is a physically demanding sport where ball handling skills and game intelligence comes to the fore.

Ki-o-Rahi evangelist, Te Ngaeha Wanikau, possesses charisma and charm as he co-ordinates traditional events with a passion and far-sightedness. He has lead the organisation of Ki-o-Rahi nationals at Turangi.

Our elders lead the way. They deemed to carry on with the revival of our ball sports against the odds in a society where Maori are expected to fit in with the Pakeha agenda, yet such actions are not reciprocated. Listen to their wise words, respect their call. Copy their noble actions, their role modelling of cultural rebirth and sustenance, of the taonga tuku iho we lovingly nurture today called Ki-o-Rahi. Soon they will be gone, support and awhi their strident call, while we have them here to guide us.

Ki-o-rahi is very much the minnow sport at present, compared to rugby. Moderates are calling for people to be able to play both sports without recriminations. Many are asking, "If we treat the revival of Ki-o-Rahi in such a callous and disrespectful way now, what will the backlash be in the future when the inevitable happens and Ki-o-Rahi rises to prominence?"

Many sportspeople are doing the sensible thing and are enjoying the virtues of both sports. It is hoped that the NZ Rugby Football Union will see the benefits of Ki-o-Rahi being developed compatibly within our society. An open and positive response will be one way for the NZRFU to banish their deeply imbedded racism towards Maori.

NZ has often been laconically called 'The Land of the Wrong White Crowd'. I can't see the sense in the typical Pakeha knee-jerk reaction of denigrating Maori initiatives, of trying to squash and minimise their histories or resist their influences. I am one of fourty students from this years Otago class who vows to assist Maori with the dissemination of their cultural sports icon, Ki-o-Rahi, throughout New Zealand and to the four corners of the world. See if we don't!