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Celebrations at Ratana Pa mark the birth of the prophet Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana - Source: ONE News -
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Politics played a backseat at Ratana on Saturday as the real festivities got underway.
Ratana, near Wanganui, is the home to the annual celebration of the Maori religious movement and this weekend's festival traditionally marks the beginning of the political year.
Thousands of people have travelled to the small settlement to celebrate the prophet Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana's birthday.
Two thousand pieces of fried fish, 120 kilograms of potatoes and 40 chopped cabbages were prepared for Saturday night's dinner.
"Muzza" has been cooking for this event for three decades.
"We're having coleslaw tonight with the fish so they are just cutting the cabbage," he says.
Organisers are preparing more than 10,000 meals this weekend, the hot food a break from the chilly camping weather.
"I slept by my sister and I went in a blanket," says a young girl attending the celebrations.
It's the busiest weekend of the year for the local dairy.
The prophet Ratana is buried at the local temple. And it was his connection with Labour Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage in 1936 that formalised ties with the party, turning Ratana into a political event.
It has become the curtain raiser of the political year.
Ratana minister Joe Everitt has seen a number of prime ministers come to Ratana.
He says the church is moving away from Labour.
"It is with the Maori party alright. When you consider what the Maori Party are going through now, land claims, foreshore and seabed (legislation) and all of that. You know, they are looking at that to come back to them."
Labour leader Phil Goff will be playing up the historic ties with Labour when he is welcomed onto the marae on Sunday, along with about 30 MPs from the Labour and Maori parties.
Goff is expected to talk about reinvigorating Labour's relationship with the Ratana people, and also refer to the high unemployment rate of Maori in the last year that Labour was in power.
