Whanganui mayoral and council candidate DC Harding sees huge potential for youth wellbeing and opportunities in the district. Photo / Bevan Conley
Whanganui mayoral and council candidate DC Harding sees huge potential for youth wellbeing and opportunities in the district. Photo / Bevan Conley
Whanganui musician, Māori author and former mayoral candidate Daniel (DC) Harding of Ngāi Tahu chats with reporter Te Kakenga Kawiti-Bishara about his dreams for the people of Whanganui. He also shares his Spotify gym playlist.
If you gave me your headphones and Spotify account right now, what music could I expect to hear?
Honestly, I have the best gospel playlist around. This type of music makes you want to holler and scream and shout, especially on the treadmill at the gym. I’m talking everything from Deitrick Hatton all the way to the old-school The Clark Sisters, Yolanda Adams - oh, just anything that gets me going at the gym.
You’ve been through a lot - your house flooded just before Waitangi weekend. How are you and your whānau coping? Talk me through what happened.
Yeah, the Friday before Waitangi weekend. I was the only one home at the time, but my nephew also lives with me - he was in Hāwera. I was playing PlayStation and chatting to some friends and I went, “Oi, I think my house is about to flood”, and I could just see the water was rising.
I had a moat around my house. As it continued to rise, I opened the door and saw the water lapping up against the ledge. Honest, I was like, ‘Oh, surely it won’t rise that much...’
Within 30 seconds, a blanket I placed to block the water started [getting pushed] away and every door now had water seeping through. I instantly had to think about salvaging what I could. Because I was the only one home, it was up to me to save what I could. An experience I won’t forget.
If there was one career path you would like to pursue for a day, what would it be?
I had a random epiphany one day. I was like, ‘Maybe I should do a bout in journalism’, and it’s because of all the rangahau [research] and information I’ve acquired over the years, and I just feel like putting it all in a random article and letting whoever read it. Not as a full-time profession, though.
Hobbiton Holes in Matamata. DC nearly had a stint in the mock-up of 'The Hobbit'. Photo / 123rf
You had a near-stint in a film? What happened there?
Well, I was offered a movie role in a mock Hobbit film and was like, ‘Oh yeah, I’ll put my toe in the water and give it a try, I guess’. As production got started though, I thought, ‘Nah, this is not for me’.
That takeaway from the movie stint led you, somewhere along the lines, to run for a seat on the Whanganui council, and even run for mayor. Tell me your why, how, what and where.
Before I came back to Whanganui after some time away, I went on an identity search and wanted to do a deep dive into my whakapapa [genealogy], whānau history and the like.
My iwi Ngāi Tahu is a large tribe. I went to visit all the marae I connect to and visited loved ones in our urupā [cemetery]. Once I found myself, I picked myself up and came back to Whanganui, with the intention to support the community in whatever way I could.
So, I put my name forward for both Whanganui District Council and mayor, and one of the reasons why I wanted to do that was actually to show Māori within our district what was possible with a Māori voice at the table.
Heck, it was many years ago when former deputy mayor Rangi Wills was the Māori voice at that level. For me, I wanted to show other Māori, young and old, what’s possible. The other reason was to support and tautoko the community in whatever way I could. I had a vision for Whanganui.
Hey, tell me about those books you’re writing. Can I let our readers know about them now?
Yeah, I’m currently in the process of writing at least two books. One, in particular, is about my employment experiences. I kind of just pick them up and start jotting thoughts down every time I need to or I learn a lesson - lessons I’ve learned in employment, focusing on the positive experiences, not particularly the ‘this organisation did this to me’.
Of course, no past employers and organisations are named, it’s more ‘this is what’s happened and the lessons I’ve gained from it’. Another book I’m writing is ‘Things everyone in their 20s should know’, which I’m revising at the moment.
So the census and general election are coming up. You’ve been quite vocal about seeing democratic processes taught better to those who want a better understanding of it. There was something else coming up in March that you wanted to tell constituents here, particularly the Māori ones. What is that?
Āe e hoa. This March, those that chose to enrol on the general roll for the elections will have the option, if they wish, to change to the Māori roll. What I want to let people know is simply this: the more people on the Māori roll, the more Māori seats there will be in Parliament. My personal goal after I tried for mayoralty was to get as many people on the Māori roll as possible and pump up the number of Māori seats in Parliament.
Ok, winding down, where do you go for a Friday night chill?
I do karaoke with my friends or we hit the Porridge Watson. We know the place well enough, so that’s our local.
Getting hungry now - have you got a recommendation for a good meal in Whanganui?
