Otis Whinney

Weekly Pacific Politics with Otis Whinney Aotearoa’s own Tāmaki Makaurau is often referred to as the largest Pacific city in the world, and there is much truth in that description. The city’s Pacific population exists in all corners of Aotearoa’s most populous city, but suburbs and neighborhoods within South Auckland have become the most famous examples of the Pacific community in the city. Māngere, Manurewa, and Takānini in particular have become significant targets for a certain political...

Weekly Pacific Politics with Otis Whinney The changing climate, fallout from foreign wars, and the ongoing drug crisis are just some of the reasons security has been at the forefront of any discussion between Pacific Island nations and their allies. The question of how to remain sovereign in a world where great powers seem content to throw their weight (and missiles) around to get their way is also permeating the minds of Pacific politics. Matthew Wale, who has done the rounds in the region...

Weekly Pacific Politics with Otis Whinney THE COCONUT CARTEL AND OUR DRUG PROBLEM If you told me that, just a few months ago, a senior member of a Pasifika-led organised crime group dubbed the ‘Coconut Cartel’ was assassinated in Vietnam by a pair of Sāmoans hired by his criminal rivals, I daresay I would have laughed in your face. But this did in fact happen, in what has become one of the strangest developments in our ongoing drug crisis in the moana we all inhabit. This event connects...