Dame Whina Cooper
(1895 – 1994)
Dame Whina Cooper of Te Rarawa was a New Zealand kuia who worked for many years for the rights of Māori and particularly to improve the lot of Māori women. She is remembered for leading the 1975 Māori land march from Te Hāpua to Wellington — a distance of 1,100 km — at the age of 79. Her people bestowed upon her the title Te Whaea o te Motu — Mother of the Nation. The hīkoi became a defining moment in the history of Aotearoa New Zealand and changed the relationship between Parliament and Māori forever. Her legacy lives on in every step taken for whenua, for wāhine, for our people.
Whina Cooper
Whina Cooper, of Te Rārawa, was born in northern Hokianga in 1895. She took part in local affairs and by the 1930s had become a leader of the northern Hokianga people.
Dame Whina Cooper
Māori have a long history of activism against land confiscations at the hands of the Crown, which broke many promises of modern New Zealand’s founding document, the Treaty of Waitangi, signed in 1840. Two such protest movements are the Land March of 1975 and occupation of Takaparawhau Bastion Point during 1977 and 1978 – powerful events that forever changed the course of life in Aotearoa New Zealand.