Collins knew the power of words, was often a man of few
Fa’anānā Efeso Collins died yesterday age 49, leaving behind his wife Fia and two daughters. His death brought quiet to parliament and a torrent of tributes
Mōrena, and welcome to The Bulletin for Thursday, February 22, written by Anna Rawhiti-Connell.
In today’s edition: Green candidate wins Wellington council byelection after all; Hipkins says comments by Ginny Andersen about Mark Micthell went too far; Ombudsman finds Oranga Tamariki failing to follow its own laws; but first, the life of Fa’anānā Efeso Collins remembered
Fa’anānā Efeso Collins, 1974 - 2024
There are days in this job where I’m working hard to string things together, filling space with rapidly acquired interpretations, summaries and my own words. Today is not one of those days. Pointing to the words of others following the shocking and profoundly sad death of Green MP Fa’anānā Efeso Collins yesterday is all that’s required. From those who knew and worked with Collins and those who’ve summarised his life and death for the wider public, the words are sincere and dignified exemplars of our capacity to craft meaning and publicly share and express emotion. Collins was a master of words in the most oratorical sense of the word, but, as RNZ’s Jo Moir writes, he also had an “ability to connect people and at times break tension with just a few words.”
Mad Chapman has penned an extraordinary obituary for Collins, sharing a defining anecdote about his brief stint at Auckland Grammar. For Chapman, the instant familiarity felt between Pacific people doing public-facing jobs made the bridge to familiarity very short when they met. She notes he spent his life being a bridge between Pacific people and the whole of Aotearoa, sharing that as his goal with her at Waitangi two weeks ago. I observed that interview at Waitangi while queuing for fry bread. Collins wasn’t looking around for the next chat as people of status sometimes do but looked to be deep in conversation.
Marked as a future leader, motivated by his kids
Collins first emerged as a student politician. He appeared on Holmes in 1999, making the case for joining student associations at a time when many were shifting away from compulsory membership. Our politics podcast, Gone by Lunchtime, was mid-record when the news broke yesterday. Toby Manhire, Annabelle Lee-Mather and Ben Thomas spend the last part of the pod talking about Collins. Thomas, who first met Collins at university, describes him as exuding charisma and being “marked out as a future leader” even back then. Collins became an Auckland councillor and ran for mayor of the city before entering parliament for the Greens just four months ago. The Herald’s Simon Wilson spent time on the mayoral campaign trail with Collins. He makes many observations in his tribute, but Collins’s love for his kids and his motivation for being involved in politics stand out right now. Read in concert with this watch, a 2022 Tagata Pasifika interview after his family received death threats, it’s clear his family was his “whole world”. Stuff’s Steve Kilgallon also writes beautifully about Collins, noting his acute awareness of being a big brown guy with a preference for hoodies and basketball singlets who dressed carefully in public because “if you’ve got to dress a certain way for people to feel okay, and have a conversation, that’s the reality of it”. My husband and Collins talked about that as the two big brown guys in matching linen jackets at an event before Christmas. Kilgallon notes that one of his primary sources of discomfort on the mayoral campaign trail was “how those who opposed him didn’t share his measured approach to the debate.”
A solemn day at parliament
This morning, The Spinoff’s Joel MacManus joins Moir and others in the press gallery to provide a unique and moving account of a solemn day at parliament. “For one day, parliament felt like a different world, with everyone remembering just how fleeting and vulnerable life is,” he writes. MacManus quotes Green party co-leader James Shaw, who fronted a sombre press pack yesterday, just 90 minutes after finding out his colleague and friend had died. “It’s in moments like this where you see parliament, and parliamentarians, at their best. There’s a real scrap going on at the moment between the government and opposition over a number of issues. Everyone said this is bigger than any of us,” he said. For those wondering about what happens at parliament after this rare event, Stewart Sowman-Lund has a walkthrough of parliamentary protocol and convention.
Maiden speech given just last week
To end, a reflection from Grant Robertson. On Instagram, Robertson wrote that Collins looked directly at him while giving his maiden speech last week. “He was talking about his journey on rainbow issues. It was an important moment between us, that I will treasure. The speech is well worth your time, and an indication of what we have all lost.” For a time, Collins’s stance on marriage equality, informed by his Christian faith, created distance between him and others. He was public about the understanding he went on to develop and bridged the distance by acknowledging those hurt by his previous stance. Collins’s grip on the power of words to make ourselves understood and broaden our understanding of each other is on full display in his maiden speech. Yesterday, that speech became something else and now stands as part of his legacy. It is worth your time.
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Green candidate wins Wellington council after all
After some quite definitive coverage of Karl Tiefenbacher, the “ice cream guy”, winning the critical Wellington council byelection on Saturday (based on provisional results), special votes have handed the win to Green party candidate Geordie Rogers. The Pukehīnau/Lambton General Ward seat was vacated by Tamatha Paul after she won the Wellington Central seat in the general election last year. Initial progress results showed Tiefenbacher ahead of Rogers by 621 votes. A count of final on-the-day votes on Saturday evening reduced his margin to 164. Rogers won on special votes by a margin of 45 votes. Tiefenbacher has three days to apply to the district court for a recount. Joel MacManus explains why this particular byelection was so crucial for the future of the city.
Hipkins says Ginny Andersen went too far in comments about police minister Mark Mitchell
Labour’s police spokesperson Ginny Andersen made the comments about Mitchell’s former career on Newstalk ZB yesterday morning. Andersen made claims about Mitchell being “paid to kill people” and asked if he kept a “tally of how many you shot”. “I think Ginny went too far with her comments; I don’t agree with all of her comments either. And she’s apologised for them,” Hipkins said. The Herald later reported that Andersen issued a statement in which she didn’t apologise but acknowledged her comments “crossed a line” and that she’d spoken to Mitchell about them. Since then, Mitchell has said he does not know whether he killed anyone during a siege while he was a private security contractor in Iraq, but says for the rest of his time in security in the Middle East he had not killed anyone.
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Preyanka Gothanayagi tells a story of housing in Wellington by laying bare her own journey through the 11 houses she's rented. Mohamed Hasan describes how his own experiences helped him create his new comedy-drama series, Miles From Nowhere. In the final part of a three-part series on student hazing, Fox Meyer observes that what is a sad reality for some is part of the fun for others. Claire Mabey celebrates the flourishing of women-led conversations by compiling a reading list for those experiencing perimenopause and menopause.
Sporting snippets
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Australia wins the first Chappell-Hadlee Trophy Twenty20 match against the Black Caps
Following English rugby’s move to give alcohol-free zones a go during this year’s Six Nations, the Herald’s Gregor Paul encourages our rugby tsars to do the same (paywalled)
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🥹😢 So sad to lose this amazing man so young and with so much future promise to build on his already impressive legacy. It is obvious by the genuine grief & upset from the Greens & Labour colleagues that Aotearoa-New Zealand has lost a special leader in the Pacifica community & NZ as a country in general.
Arohanui to whanau and friends - may his memory be a blessing.
It would be great to have an English translation (in writing on screen) of his maiden speech - we’re not all experts in Te Reo and this translation would reach a wider audience.