Ena Manuireva
E tu ana vau ei tangata tumu no Mangareva mai te taha o toku papa, e ekeranga ivi toku ki te kainga o Ta’iti ki te taha o toku mama. Na raua oki i tuku mai te aho o te ora. I stand as a Mangarevan from my father’s side and I whakapapa to Tahiti from my mother’s side. To both, I owe the breath of life.
From Ma'ohi Nui (French Polynesia) with extensive travels through Europe nurturing passion for languages and now I find myself on the shores of Aotearoa. My genealogical background is peppered with my Polynesian strand, Irish and French. I hold a Masters in Social Sciences (University of Edinburgh), a MPhil from AUT, and I am a deferred PhD candidate whose research is concentrated on language revitalisation calling upon the practice of the rongorongo (historical and cultural knowledge holders). I am hoping to give back to my community an indigenous language that thrives and resists any dominant language threats- and I want to extend my skills to protecting other endangered languages. For the last twenty years, I have become an anti-nuclear activist and campaigner for nuclear reparations justice from France concerning the over 193 tests staged in the East part of the Moana Nui a Hiva over three decades. I am a contributor to Asia Pacific Report seeking France’s accountability for indigenous human rights violations.
Te-Moana-nui-ā-kiwa and colonial violence
Covid-19: a Trojan horse to extend French Colonial violence in Mā’ohi Nui
Since its “annexation” (not without resistance by our ancestors) in 1842 as a protectorate and later a colony in 1888 into the French Republic one and indivisible, Mā’ohi Nui carries on suffering slow but permanent physical and environmental violence from France. The biggest violence visited upon the populations of Mā’ohi Nui was the 30-year long period of nuclear testing. In addition to the violence inflicted to the bodies and the lands of our people, there have been other forms of cultural and psychological violence that have surreptitiously crept into the everyday lives of our populations. The cloak of benefactor that France herself delights in wearing and presenting to other powers, is only a façade that I hope to uncover in my fireside chat. The covid-19 experience is the perfect example of the conniving and unfair way my nation has been treated- and, it is this nation, maybe unrealistically, who is demanding accountability from its so-called protector of human rights, France.
