Me kaha ake a ngāi Māori ki te koha atu i te toto me ngā whēkau. Koirā te karanga a te mema o Nahinara a Alfred Ngaro, i aia e āwhina ana i ngā kaipatu ahi me ngā kaiāwhina o te rōpū mate pukupuku o Aotearoa, ki te wero ā tau, arā te pikinga o te pourewa.
Kei te whakaheke werawera ngā kaipatu ahi hei tautoko i te hunga taotū.
Hei tā te Rangatira o Te Ope Patuahi ki Te Taunga Rerengai o Aotearoa, arā a Morehu Wilson “Koia te tikanga i whakakotahi ai ngā kaipatu ahi puta noa ki Aotearoa, hei kaitiaki me kī mō te hunga kua pāngia e te mate toto.”
Neke atu i te toru tekau tau a Morehu Wilson (Ngāti Pāoa) e mahi ana hei kaitinei ahi, hei tāna, “That's the main reason of us firefighters of Aotearoa have come together, to protect those suffering from blood cancer.”
14 tau te kaupapa nei e whanake ana, he 200 rātau i timatanga, ā nō te tau nei neke atu i te iwa rau i tae atu. Ko Morehu Wilson tērā, rima tekau mā whā ōna tau, engari hei tāna he pūru taitama tonu.
“E ai ki a rātau he kaumātua ahau, heoti kei te rongo tonu au i ngā kare ā-roto o te taiohi, o te rangatahi.”
Ehara i ngā kaipatu ahi anake e whakapau kaha ana, ko te kaitōrangapū Alfred Ngaro hoki tērā, e akiaki ana i ngā Māori me ngā Iwi Moutere kia tū, hei kaituku toto.
“I was working with Pio (Terei) today and his son who's unfortunately passed away but one of the things he found was that there wasn't enough Māori and Pasifik on the bone marrow donor registry... trying to get more of our guys Māori and Polynesian to go on the register and to be donors and blood donors and now the register is up and that's important,” te kī a Ngaro.
Ko Maaka McKinney hoki tērā kua tae ki te mutunga o tāna hīkoi roa e aro hāngai ana ki ngā taumaha ka amohia e rātau mā kei ngā ope tieki.
“So as first responders we're continuously exposed to a lot of traumatic type scenes you know we do a lot to ensure that our communities safe and protect them but we forget to think about ourselves.”
Hei whakawhānui ake ko tā McKinney, “Once you've been to one scene after another after another scene, it starts to stack up on you so the aim this year is to get our first responders to get out and get professional support.”
Ko tā Maaka ināianei he whai rautaki e noho ai he kurī hei mōkai tautoko, i ngā kaimahi ohotata.
