Brian Rudman: Pasifika needs to be promoted to the world, not moved

COMMENT

What a depressingly Auckland reaction Manukau city councillor Su'a William Sio has to the growing success of the Pasifika Festival. He wants to hijack it from its traditional venue in Western Springs and repatriate it to its "natural home" of Otara.

Instead of celebrating the growing success of this regional event and inquiring if there was any help he and his council could offer to make it even better, he trots out population statistics to try to make a case.

Manukau has 72,281 citizens of Pacific origin while Auckland city has only 50,416. Therefore the festival should be Otara's.

What he leaves out of this equation is the rather crucial figure of how much Manukau is offering by way of financial support. Is Mr Sio and his council willing to front up with the $132,000 backing Auckland ratepayers came up with this year and last? And can he guarantee to hold on to the additional $200,000 in sponsorships and stall rentals that helped fund this year's event?

I guess if you really had to argue the case for keeping Pasifika where it is, a good starting point would be that Grey Lynn was the first stopping-off place of the first wave of Pacific Island migrants back in the 1950s, therefore the festival is in its "natural home" where it is.

But as Auckland City Council doesn't want to give it up, and Nuku Rapana, chairman of the advisory group looking into the future directions of the festival says it's not the issue, it seems if Mr Sio wants a festival he'd better start one of his own.

But that rather misses the point too. If the Pasifika Festival is a valuable asset, both as a life enhancer for all Aucklanders and as a drawcard for tourists, then it's an asset the whole region benefits from, not just one for the people of Grey Lynn, or Auckland city.

That's hardly an original thought. Auckland city councillor Penny Sefuiva has been bending my ear along these lines since the event stumbled into life over a decade ago.

Back then she chaired the local community committee and was preaching the tourism benefits that could eventuate if the whole region worked together to support and fund the event. So far, her message has failed to get through. Despite the deaf ears, she continues to beat the drum.

Brown skins are a huge tourist attraction, she says, with people travelling the Pacific taking in the local cultural festivals.

It's a good point. We brag about being the first city of the Pacific, of being the largest Polynesian city in the world, but what do we do to take advantage of this exotic self-labelling? Well, not a lot.

It seems crazy that the region can host the two largest Polynesian festivals in the world within a few days of each other - Pasifika and the Auckland Secondary Schools Maori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival - yet there's no joint marketing or promotion or organisational co-operation.

Why not? Where's Tourism Auckland? Where are the marketing arms of the various city councils? Would it be so hard to sit down with these two big events, link in some of the others that seem to pop up at this time of the year, and market them as a package? With the fledgling Auckland Festival due to assume a summer guise from next year, now would be the perfect time to start co-operating.

It would also give Scott Milne, chairman of Auckland City's recreation and events committee, a therapeutic diversion from his doomed V8 car race project.

When you think of it, what a shame someone from Pasifika didn't get to Mr Milne before the petrolheads.

We're told the street race will drag in 150,000 spectators in year one. Chickenfeed. This year, Pasifika attracted 170,000 visitors, and the school festival 100,000.

The street race will cost ratepayers an interest-free loan of $3.5 million over seven years, a cost of $888,763. With it will come citywide gridlock. Compare that to the known costs of the two festivals.

As for tourists, what do you suspect is a greater drawcard? Yet another car race, or a chance to attend the one and only greatest Polynesian festival in the world?

Herald Feature: Pasifika Festival

Auckland City Pasifika Festival webpage