The largest festival of its kind in the world, the ASB Polyfest has become a powerful force, uniting Māori and Pacific cultures.
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The seeds of Polyfest were sewn in October 1976, a potent time in New Zealand’s history, with racial tensions brewing alongside what’s been called the Māori renaissance. In our cities, Pacific people were being targeted by police in the notorious Dawn Raids. While, among Māori, long-repressed anger was evolving into organised activism – just months later the occupation of Bastion Point would begin.
Among a bunch of teens at Hillary College (now Sir Edmund Hillary College) in Ōtara an idea was beginning to formulate. Te Manaaroha Rollo (now Dr Te Manaaroha Rollo) thought of it first. “I’m glad you found me,” she tells TVNZ, before diving back through the decades to what she remembers as a happy time and place. “Ōtara was a thriving little village. It had lots of Pacific Islanders, Māori families and also Pākehā.”
But at Hillary College, the only cultural group to compete with other schools was kapa haka, and that’s where teenage Rollo saw room for change. “Why can’t we have something more diverse by getting our Pacific brothers and sisters involved in a festival?” she said to her best friend. “We were snotty little teenagers,” she laughs. “Actually we were quite frightened to step into that arena and we thought… how are we going to make this work? So the first thing was actually talking to our student leaders at Hillary college.”
That included Boaz Raela, another student then, now a teacher and Polyfest stalwart, who didn’t take a lot of convincing. “We kind of just ran with it, you know?” he says, adding that they soon realised they were going to need a few teachers and parents on board.
Four schools competed on the stage at Hilary College. It was the smallest the festival would ever be but, for Raela, the most memorable. He’ll never forget performing a powerful haka about alcohol on the marae.
The energy was electric. The punters packed out the hall. Something destined to be massive had begun.
Meanwhile, that very day in October 1976, the lead story on the news was about the Dawn Raids. The sharp contrast – between a joyous and respectful celebration of Māori and Pacific culture and a co-ordinated targeting of Pacific people – isn’t lost on Rollo. “Being Māori we embrace our Pacific Island whānau, because that’s where our roots come from,” she says. “We travelled that Pacific. When they hurt, we hurt.”
‘Every year it’s a struggle’
When Polyfest was born, money was no issue – because there wasn’t any. Rollo and her friends weren’t bothered, thinking: “We just wanna do it! We don’t have to have money, we’ve got the hall.”
Tupou Manapouri MNZM QSM, now 80, a former teacher at Hillary College, has been involved with Polyfest since 1980. She recalls sending students down the road to pick ferns by the creek to make their hula skirts. “That’s how we started,” she says. “Very simple.”
Cut to 2025 and Polyfest (now named ASB Polyfest in honour of its biggest financial backer) is the largest cultural festival of its kind in the world, spanning four days, concluding today, with a record-breaking 11,000 students from 77 schools involved, despite the weather.
And yet the battle for adequate funding continues. “Every year it’s a struggle,” says event director Seiuli Terri Leo-Mauu.
Despite its size, half-century sticking power, and audience of impressionable teens, Polyfest just isn’t an easy sell to sponsors.
“We’re still having to justify the impact that this festival makes,” says Leo-Mauu. “But regardless of that, our festival is resilient. Our people are resilient.
