From his birth certificate to his bank statement, Wellington local Sean Rāhui's name has been spelt incorrectly for years. It’s unclear why the macron’s missing, but it’s possible it stems from an inability to record macrons in official systems.
He's been on a mission to fix it, even butting heads with a Government department that's taken a Māori name for itself - but doesn't allow Māori to spell theirs correctly.
Rāhui, who is of Te Roroa descent, didn't learn te reo at school - it wasn't an option. He started learning as an adult, leading him to the discovery about his own name.
"Without macron it doesn't exist," he told Newshub Nation.
"I realised as I was learning te reo Māori that the word Rahui without a macron doesn't actually exist in te reo Māori and that the correct pronunciation is Rāhui, and that requires the macron."
His name had been spelt incorrectly his entire life, a mistake that's stripped the meaning from the name for generations.
"I knew when I saw that it was my responsibility to try to restore the mana of my name to try to recognise my tipuna and return that tohutō to the name that I carry," he said.
He doesn't know how it was lost but knows there will be others in the same situation.
"I suppose it was the result of that big old beast colonisation. I don't think there was ever the capability in the early days to add macrons to official documents," Rāhui said.
Te reo Māori advocate Stacey Morrison gets where he's coming from.
"Rahui without the macron - so Rahui as opposed to Rāhui - isn't a word. So I can see why that feels, actually, not very nice," she said.
A rāhui - with that long a - means a restriction or a protection. Morrison says it's just one example of how much macrons matter.
"It can really significantly change the meaning of words, for instance: tatari means to wait, whereas tātari means to sift or sieve something."
So Rāhui was surprised when he went to the Department of Internal Affairs to get this birth certificate corrected and was told it would cost $170. Disappointed, he posted about it on Facebook.
"Quite quickly they came round and agreed to provide me with an amended birth certificate with a macron, but I suppose the wero [challenge] for them is: I'm one person, and while I appreciate the efforts they made for me, there's really a system-wide issue here."
Seeing that new birth certificate was powerful. “It restores the mana of my name, and recognises who I am and where I've come from. Which is part of being Māori,” Rāhui says.
Birth certificate sorted, Rāhui moved on to other departments. The IRD now addresses him correctly, but an attempt to fix his drivers licence wasn't so successful.
"The response from Waka Kotahi was quite disappointing. They have indicated that it's not possible to add the macron to my drivers licence."
That's despite Waka Kotahi adopting its Māori name in 2019. It was previously NZTA.
"It's not good enough just to adopt a Māori name, it has to be more systematic, '' insists Rāhui.
"If they can't change the names of the drivers licences to reflect the real Māori names of the drivers of Aotearoa New zealand that's not good enough."
Like Waka Kotahi, Kiwibank's system couldn't add his macron.
"They have advised there's no process to add macrons to my name. Kiwibank - maybe not quite our bank," Rāhui said.
"It's a little bit odd that an official language of New Zealand isn't able to be correctly represented or written on an official document, so surely this is an oversight, and it's a fairly easy one to fix, '' said Morrison.
Now, one department has fixed it. The DIA told Newshub Nation because of concerns raised by Rāhui, it reviewed its processes and will no longer charge people for fixing missing macrons.
Kiwibank however, says it's still working on it.
It may be Te Wiki o Te Reo Maori, Māori Language Week, but for this story about correcting historic te reo wrongs, Māori Crown Relations Minister Kelvin Davis and Māori Development Minister Willie Jackson refused to be interviewed.
Transport Minister Michael Wood has told Waka Kotahi that whenever their system is next updated, macrons must be added. That could take five years.
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