Photo / Newshub
Television journalist and presenter Mike McRoberts (Ngāti Kahungunu) has barely been able to contain his anger – and tears - when asked by the Herald on Sunday if he receives the same racist criticism for being or speaking Māori on national TV as Newshub colleague Oriini Kaipara or TVNZ weather presenter Te Rauhiringa Brown.
"I haven't experienced that. It's only been our wāhine and that says everything about these f**king gutless people that do it," McRoberts told Reset magazine in an interview for today's Herald on Sunday.
McRoberts says he is grateful for the support from Kaipara, a native speaker who became the first indigenous woman in the world to read mainstream news with a moko kauae.
Recently, Kaipara made headlines for publicly defending herself against racist comments around her traditional moko being offensive and Brown has also had to defend constant complaints about incorporating te reo Māori in her weather bulletins.
"The disgusting and vile shit that they throw at our wonderful Māori women angers me," says McRoberts, who was interviewed for Reset magazine by freelance journalist Aroha Awarau.
"If my reaction is extreme it is because they are extreme. They need to piss off! They don’t belong in Aotearoa!” he says.