Hone Harawira wants to stay with Maori Party

BY MARTIN KAY

Maori Party MPs emerged tight-lipped from their first caucus meeting since the future of renegade MP Hone Harawira was put on the line.

Mr Harawira today obeyed an order to stay away from Parliament for two weeks while his future is considered by the party leadership, and whether he stays or goes was sure to have been discussed among the remaining four MPs this morning.

In a show of unity, the quartet walked together into Parliament this afternoon, but co-leaders Tariana Turia and Pita Sharples would not discuss what was said during the caucus meeting.

They left all comment to party whip Te Ururoa Flavell.

He said the party had decided not to say anything till the end of the two week period which Mr Hararwira, the MP for Te Tai Tokerau, has been given to show he can toe the line.

“I’ve been asked on behalf of our leadership and our party to tell all media that we’ve entered into a process to wait for a two week interval to allow all of us to take some stock and we’ll be making a statement after that.

“We’ve given the Tai Tokerau, and indeed Hone and ourselves, some breathing space and we ask that all media respect that.”

Mr Harawira has been given two weeks leave to consider his next move after Maori Party bosses told him he should consider quitting and remaining in Parliament as an independent MP.

But there was speculation he would turn up to today's meeting regardless.

There was also speculation this morning that Mr Harawira was on the verge of resigning to go it alone but Mr Harawira emphatically rejected those rumours.

" [It's] not true," he said.

Mr Harawira's mother, long-time activist Titewhai was also emphatic that nothing had changed since the situation was discussed at a hui last week, where Mr Harawira labelled the call for him to resign from the Maori Party "silly".

Decisions on his future lay in the hands of his Te Tai Tokerau constituents, Mrs Harawira said.

Mr Harawira is in strife after stirring up a backlash with emailed comments about "white motherf..." while defending a side-trip to Paris during a taxpayer-funded trip to Europe on Parliamentary business.

In his Northland Age column today, Mr Harawira admitted the email had caused a lot of political damage to himself and let down his party.

"I recognise there needs to be some serious bridge building on my part with my caucus colleagues, and I will be doing so over the next weeks."

Mr Harawira said he did not intend leaving his party, despite the party and others suggesting he should do so. His leaders have asked him to take time off.

Prime Minister John Key said today if Mr Harawira left the party and became independent it would have no impact on the National Government as it had brought the Maori Party on board as part of a willing partnership rather than out of necessity.

Political damage done by Mr Harawira's comments was minimal because the Maori Party had made it clear it didn't support them.

"In the end this is an issue for Maori Party leadership to deal with, and I think they're doing their best in very difficult circumstances," he told reporters.

He said Mr Harawira's Tai Tokerau electorate needed to decide whether there was still a place for him in Parliament.

"The reality is that there are lots of people in Parliament who have quite extreme views, and who are quite colourful characters, and if we are going to exclude from Parliament people who say things we don't like, then it's going to be a very interesting Parliament."

Mr Key said the "vast bulk" of New Zealanders would not have been supportive of the comments which got Mr Harawira into hot water.

Meanwhile, Buddy Mikaere, who received the offending email and made it public, said he didn't regret doing so.

He told The New Zealand Herald he released it after Mr Harawira challenged him to.

The offensive comments were in response to an email Mr Mikaere sent questioning the way Mr Harawira skipped off to Paris while on a parliamentary visit to Brussels.

The reply was: "White motherf...kers have been raping our lands and ripping us off for centuries and all of a sudden you want me to play along with their puritanical bullshit?"

Mr Mikaere told the paper he considered Mr Harawira was not fit to be an MP.

- with NZPA,  TRACY WATKINS, Stuff.co.nz

- © Fairfax NZ News