
- By Adam Julian
The Hurricanes Poua haka, and reaction to it, has been one of the biggest news stories in New Zealand this week and one of the few times in women’s rugby history that the sport has landed itself on the front page of newspapers and television networks. Social media has gone berserk with reaction to the politically charged haka’s to start Super Rugby Aupiki. What’s going on? What are some of the contested viewpoints? Correspondence to club rugby this week has been spirited and contrasting.
Who is Leilani Perese
A versatile front-rower who can play both sides of the scrum makes Leilani Perese (Ngāpuhi) an asset in a squad scenario. Since her debut against Australia in 2018 she has made 11 appearances off the bench covering both loosehead and tighthead. What are the differences in each position?
“As a loosehead prop, my objective is to pop the opposite’s chest up and manipulate her to move as I please so she cannot dominate me. A loosehead prop needs to be set much lower than the opposite and be very fast on the bind. It’s crucial to keep a strong profile on this side too.
“The tighthead prop (125 kg) is predominantly a stronger prop as they anchor in the scrum wedged between a hooker and the prop’s head. Tightheads also need to manipulate their opposites. Scrumming straight and forward to manipulate the opposite to go down is an easy penalty.”
Her first-class career started with Auckland for whom she played 15 games from 2012 to 2014. In that period Auckland won 23 out of 24 games, enjoying two unbeaten seasons.
Additionally, she helped Manurewa replace Marist and College Rifles as the dominant forces in Auckland club rugby, anchoring the ‘Rewa’ scrum in their 2013 and 2015 Coleman Shield triumphs. She has also played club rugby for Ponsonby and Hora Hora.
Perese (31) switched to Counties in 2016 and her effect was immediate, assisting the Heat in winning the inaugural Farah Palmer Cup. She missed a month after the opening round victory against Waikato bouncing back strongly to start the semi-final trouncing of Wellington and the 41-22 mauling of her former province in the decider.
In 2017 Perese stamped her mark on the rugby scene when she played all eight games for Counties, starting six on the loosehead side and two on the tighthead as the Heart returned to the Farah Palmer Cup final.
Her try in the 22-17 victory over Auckland in the semi-final was vital. National honours followed a year later when she made her Black Ferns debut in the 31-11 victory over the Wallaroos in Sydney.
“I remember during the national anthem, I cried. I couldn’t help but be happy. My mum flew over from New Zealand and surprised me in our warmup. I had a ‘we did it’ moment thinking of all the early mornings, late nights and everyone that had helped me to get to this moment.” She went on to feature in all five tests that season with Grand Slam champions France providing valuable lessons.
“I’ve never been folded in a scrum before, so it was a huge learning experience for me. The French are very tough and unpredictable.”
Typically, she finds her teammates the toughest to play against with Aleisha-Pearl Nelson and Aldora Itunu respected friends and adversaries.
“Aleisha is an amazing. She knows how to manipulate someone to her advantage, and I have experienced that many times. Aldora is just a big hitter; I learned the hard way not to run it straight into her.”
In 2019 Perese helped New Zealand win the Super Series featuring Canada, France, England, and the USA with a string of strong cameos from the bench. In August she appeared in both home and away test wins against Australia.
“A starter is someone that comes in hot. They can hit the ground running and execute their role for much of the game. A sub is someone who takes over and does even more damage. They are like a second tsunami. They are also players who are not as effective for a long period, but can be effective and turn a game at the end.”
Perese derives just as much joy off the field as she does on the field with the Black Ferns.
“I have the best times with the ‘Flatties.’ We have bananagram tournaments in our downtime during camp. We get really competitive; we dream about cool words we can make. It gets really heated when we play in teams.”
Despite ACL reconstruction on both knees, she’s also played Ki-o-Rahi and Kabaddi for New Zealand, attending two World Cups in India in the later code.
She was a teacher at Tangaroa College in Auckland, having worked at The Mad Butcher, Whangarei. Some of her former colleagues from the butcher flew to Perth to watch Perese play Australia in 2019.
In April 2022 her mother Rana Paraha, a teacher at a Maori immersion school, had the Northland senior women’s trophy named after her. Paraha debuted for Hora Hora in 1996. Despite reconstructions of both knees, she played as recently as 2018 aged 50. She has helped her club Hora Hora win 17 senior championships. As a coach, organiser, and advocate she has performed every role in the game from washing jerseys to mentoring leading Black Ferns, including Krystal Murray, Charmaine McMenamin, Arihiana Marino-Tauhinu and Leilani.
Rana, a winger who became a prop, was encouraged to play rugby by All Black Bevan Holmes and her mother Phobie had a photo on the wall of her playing for a hospital laundromat team well before women’s rugby was fashionable.
On March 2, 2024, Leilani was the kaitāraki (leader) of a controversial haka in the Hurricanes 24-46 opening round loss to Chiefs Manawa in Super Rugby Aupiki.
She called out “karetao o te Kāwana kakiwhero” or “puppets of this redneck government”.
Joining the chant, the team acknowledged Te Whakaputanga (Declaration of Independence), a contract signed between Ngāpuhi chiefs and the Crown before Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and mana motuhake – Māori sovereignty.
The haka referred to Toitu te Tiriti, a political movement that has taken a stand against coalition government policies on te reo Māori and perceived breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi and encouraged people to “never fold and never bend”.
Haka composer Hinewai Pomare (Te Rarawa, Ngā Puhi, Ngāti Pūkenga, Ngāi Te Rangi and Tararā) said she wrote the haka after players reached out, adding the segment to the beginning of the original piece written by Te Wehi Wright, a New Zealand Universities rugby player and qualified lawyer who won four Jubilee Cup championships with Old Boys university.
The haka caused a public furore with Hurricanes CEO Alvan Lee claiming he was “blind-sighted” by its performance and that the Hurricanes will never perform it again. Lee suggested the Hurricanes would even apologise to the Government,
Act Leader David Seymour labeled the Haka “stupid” but it did garner some support from the Te Pāti Māori Party, women’s rugby advocate and former Wellington hooker Alice Soper and Kaihaka and reo expert Mataia Keepa. Perese herself was unapologetic about its performance and intention.
“This is very spicy, and we like it like that. This is exactly what we want to say.
“I felt very empowered, very excited, for this new addition into our haka.”
Perese said the reaction from her teammates was encouraging.
“They just got really, really rowdy. ‘Let’s do this!’, ‘This is powerful!’, at a time like this especially.
“More importantly, my sisters who are not Māori, I sat down with them and explained to them what is going on with our government. All the work our people have been doing for Māori and what the government is trying to do and how that makes me feel. They completely understood. They understand the mamae (pain) we’re going through, the anger and frustration. They felt it too,” she said.
Perese said she presented the new haka to the team’s management “strategically”.
“I sent it to management at the last minute. They were like ‘go for it. We back you 100%,'” she said.
Preempting any backlash the haka might drum up, Perese said she was holding strong.
“I don’t care. I believe in what we’re saying, I stand by it.
“I would tell them to shut up. I believe that in rugby, we have a platform where people watch and listen. And why not use our platform to show our people we will never fold? To tell the government that we are stronger than ever, and we will never go down without a war.”
“We wanted it to represent not just Māori, but people of all races and cultures. When we say ‘taku iwi tuohu kore e!’ that means ‘what will always last is our people, we will never fold.”
The following week against defending champions Matatū, Perese smiled before rallying the Poua calling out those who said women should not haka and presented the team as “āhuru te ārangi” – trouble-makers or disruptors. There was a repeat of similar political sentiment though less overtly.
Despite Perese conceding the first penalty she was determined and efficient in her work thereafter. The Hurricanes won a memorable victory 36-29. Fellow prop Cilia-Marie Po’e-Tofaeono wrote herself into franchise folklore with a 76th-minute try to break a 29-29 deadlock.*
“It means a lot; we’ve had a hard couple of days. We said this game was a must-win. We showed it through our actions this week rather than our words,” Hurricanes captain Jackie Patea-Fereti told Sky Sport afterward.
“We want to thank those who sent messages of support to Leilani. They came from all over the motu.”
True to form deputy Prime Minster and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters complained.
“The Hurricanes may well lose support and viewers because the CEO has a bunch of naive players damaging the brand by attempting to wade into partisan political activism without any concept of reality.”
Poua followed up this criticism with a press release where coach Ngatai Walker clarified.
“We understand there may be misinterpretation of individual words of this haka, but the intent of the meaning is, ‘Aotearoa unite, Hurutearangi (female god of the wind) has arrived; challenges may come and go, but we will endure’.
NZR Kaihautu (Chief Advisor Māori) Luke Crawford added.
“The Poua haka seeks to urge the nation in behind the team, refocus themselves back to their game and to acknowledge the key things that motivate and turn on their superpowers…Translating a single line of the haka in the way that weaponises it against the team, is frankly irresponsible especially when there are a number of other ways to translate that same line.”
* Prop Cilia-Marie Po’e-Tofaeono is from Auckland. She has played nine games for the Storm and ironically scored a try against Wellington in a 26-25 win in 2024. Her other try was in a 41-14 loss to Canterbury in that year’s Farah Palmer Cup Premiership final.
Questions & Observations
Haka has a long history of being associated with protests. Perhaps the best-known one is the Prohibition Haka, Poropeihana challenging Sir Apriana Ngata (On the $50 bill) and his two-year prohibition on alcohol on the East Coast. The words in the haka degrade Ngata’s mana and call him names like, Purari paka, kaura mōkai e! – Bloody bugger, lowlife coward!
Haka is a not rigid script. In 2022 the Black Ferns haka performance in the opening game of the Rugby World Cup went off script and added karanga at the start. According to Te Aka, a karanga is a formal call, ceremonial call, welcome call, call – a ceremonial call of welcome to visitors onto a marae, or equivalent venue, at the start of a pōwhiri (welcome).
From the Black Ferns A to Z Profile of Nino Sio: Remarkably it was reported at the time (1991 Rugby World Cup) that Sio and Elsie Paiti, both of Pacific Island extraction, were not granted permission to perform the haka and were stood down. Women performing the haka, now universally accepted, was unusual and widely criticized in 1991. Former All Black Albie Pryor said women performing a haka “breached culture norms” while Sarona Iosefa labeled it “shameful.” Sio clarified the ruckus. “It wasn’t common for Pacific Island women to perform the haka and I felt uncomfortable doing it so I asked Laurie O’Reilly before the World Cup if I could stand on the sideline while the girls performed it. He was fine with that and anything else reported about it is fiction.”
There has always been a counterculture, activism presence in women’s rugby. How is that pioneering spirit maintained as the sport integrates more into the mainstream?
Who owns the Hurricanes haka and what spirit was it presented? The author has every right to change the words but if he gifts the taonga to the Hurricanes and the original context in which it’s presented changes without the consultation of all parties isn’t that disingenuous? It would be like reaching for your favourite Led Zeppelin record and someone has put Taylor Swift inside.
When you consider an overwhelming majority of players in the match are of Māori and Pasifika decent is it surprising that strong opposition to government policies exists?
NZR Kaihautu (Chief Advisor Māori) Luke Crawford said, “Translating a single line of the haka in the way that weaponises it against the team, is frankly irresponsible especially when there are a number of other ways to translate that same line.” Luke, Redneck is a derogatory term mainly, but not exclusively, applied to white, poor, dirty, uneducated, and racist men, especially those in the Southern United States. It’s not very subtle.
The Rugby press often moans at how boring, scripted, and sanitised covering the sport is and when something like this emerges complain Poua can’t say what they said. Free speech works both ways, Winston.
Rednecks tend to be perceived as reactionary. Does the response from outfits like the Platform radio station and some politicians prove the Poua point?
Leilani Perese (Ngāpuhi) plays for the Hurricanes but she’s not from the Hurricanes area. Why are her concerns driving the message in the Hurricanes haka?
If the haka is deemed so offensive to the fanbase and officialdom, why is it performed in the first place?
Will the Hurricanes Poua political stand put more bums on seats and eyes on screens? There were no more than 500 people at the game in Hamilton the previous Saturday and Ruby Tui was playing for Chiefs Manawa. Sky Stadium was mostly empty again.
What could the Hurricanes administration have done to have punished the ringleaders of the political haka if there was a will to do so? There might have been a mutiny in the team and there might not be enough players to carry on if that were to occur.
Israel Folau took an honestly held stand based on religious grounds against gay marriage and lost his Wallabies career. Why should Poua players be allowed to push views that could be interpreted as racist and not aligned with the values of the organisation and keep their jobs?
Are those Poua with Maori sympathies changing things on the fly under the banner of language and cultural differences because of opposing pressure from fans, sponsors, and administrators? Press releases, cultural advisors, apologies. It’s like an episode of The Thick of It.
How many members of parliament have watched a game of women’s rugby since the 2022 World Cup final?
How will the Hurricanes players follow up this weekend both haka and performance-wise? The rousing 36-29 victory over the defending champions Matatū at Sky Stadium was thoroughly deserved. They only trailed for a dozen minutes and scored six tries to four. Have the girls had their 15 minutes of fame or will they seriously push for the Aupiki title and continue contesting political issues?
How will this be remembered once some of the hysteria dies down? Will it be an honourable political stand, a change in the way political stands by players are made, presented, and responded to, or will it be one big giant storm in a teacup?
Rugby shouldn’t be an excuse to avoid difficult conversations, but it is a rare space of racial and class unity. Save the culture wars for other forums.
Boy, the optics and tenor of this week are a stark contrast to the World Cup. The World Cup was staunch old white men telling us how much they loved female players. Mums and daughters attended games on mass. Colourful hair, big smiles, daring play, singalongs, and most importantly fun and unique. Things evolve organically and are different depending on the actors and environment. Many have jumped off the brief bandwagon that inevitably grows when something is fashionable and successful. Has women’s rugby this week lost what made several people fall in love with it in the first place? “Redneck,” “white supremacy,” “war,” “stupid,” “losers,” “apologise” is a far cry from the Rugby World Cup narrative.
Many of the Poua players are extremely young. Do they really understand the complexity of issues being challened and the consequences of making such a strong stand.
what a load of rubbish if they put the same amount of energy into the games they might win a few more