Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Rawiri Waititi's entitled to answer questions in Māori if he wants to

So, Shanan Halbert from the Māori Party doesn't like the fact that Rawiri Waititi answered all his media questions about Takuta Ferris in te reo Māori.

Now, if you haven't caught up on this, this is what happened yesterday when the Māori Party came face to face with the press gallery. It was the first time since Tākuta Ferris has doubled down and then tripled down for his anti-immigrant comments and then ignored his leader's orders to delete the video.

And then the leaders started, by the looks of things, ignoring media requests for interviews.

So yesterday, when the media finally had a chance to ask Rawiri about it for the first time, he refused to speak English and he would only answer in Māori, because he said it's te reo Māori week.

And Shanan Halbert from the Labour Party didn't like it because he thinks that Rawiri is creating an "exclusive bunch" of Māori. Which is presumably Māori who can speak Māori, and that, by the looks of things, excludes him.

Well, tough bickies.

If Shanan doesn't want to feel left out, he should go and learn Māori like everyone else who's spending their Wednesday nights in Māori language classes.

Look, just for the record, so before you think I'm now on Rawiri's side, I'm not.

I don't like that Rawiri is doing this, because he's obviously weaponizing the language and hiding behind it to avoid answering tough questions, and then is pretending that he's doing it for some noble reason of celebrating Māori language week. That's not what he's doing.

But set aside his childishness, he is entitled to speak Māori exclusively if he wants to. It is a national language and the man is fluent in it.

If this was a multilingual European nation instead of predominantly monolingual New Zealand, this would not be a problem.

I mean, to be fair, Rawiri probably wouldn't be able to do what he's doing because the press gallery would also be multilingual and would be able to understand what he's saying.

But Shanan's complaint is a uniquely New Zealand complaint, isn't it? Which is - don't speak the language because I can't understand it.

Again, tough bickies. It's really weird for me to hear this from a Labour Party MP, by the way.

And I would encourage Shanan to take up some Māori language classes with his free time, which there is a lot of, because he's not doing a lot in opposition.

And maybe if there is a silver lining in Rawiri being this juvenile, it is a gentle reminder to the rest of us that if we also don't want to feel like Shanan - left out - there are classes.

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