TVNZ’s ‘super-Māori’ message enters court spotlight

Summarised by Centrist

Former Breakfast host Kamahl Santamaria says internal TVNZ messages reveal racial hostility towards his appointment, including a staff member asking whether TVNZ should have recruited a “super-Māori” aligned with its Rautaki Māori strategy.

Another message referred to “the Iniana Kamahl” (Īniana is Māori for “Indian”), while others allegedly mocked his performance and mannerisms. Santamaria says TVNZ failed to provide a safe workplace and then damaged his reputation through its communications and newsroom reporting.

TVNZ denies the claims, maintains its newsroom is editorially independent and alleges Santamaria breached their settlement. The Employment Court hearing begins Monday.

Editor’s note: The irony is hard to miss. Julian Batchelor of Stop Co-governance sued TVNZ over a report characterising as racist his campaign against what he described as a Māori elite using institutional power to privilege Māori over non-Māori. TVNZ successfully defended the report, and the court found Batchelor’s wider rhetoric crossed into racism.

Now Santamaria alleges TVNZ’s own staff questioned why a “super-Māori” had not been hired instead of him. If staff objected to his appointment because he was Indian rather than Māori, that was more than support for Māori representation. It was a preference for one race over another.

That is what links the two cases. Batchelor argued that public institutions were favouring Māori over non-Māori. Santamaria now alleges TVNZ staff expressed the very racial preference Batchelor said he was opposing.

The cases are not equivalent. Santamaria’s allegations remain unproven, and they do not vindicate everything Batchelor said. But if proven, they would expose a clear double standard: rhetoric seen as hostile to Māori was condemned as racist, while racial preference favouring Māori was voiced inside TVNZ itself.

Read more at The NZ Herald (paywalled)

Image: Kamahl Santamaria 

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