Warrior Syd Jackson dies
3 September 2007 One of the leading voices of the Maori rights movement for more than four decades has died. Syd Jackson from Ngati Porou and Ngati Kahungunu died at his home just after five this afternoon of cancer. He was 68. Mr Jackson was one of eight children of Everard Jackson, a Maori All Black of the 1930s. An outstanding scholar, he earned an MA in politics before making a career in the union movement. With his then wife, the late Hana Te Hemara, he was a founding member of Nga Tamatoa, the young warriors, and spearheaded protests such as a petition to allow Maori to learn their language at school. In recent years he built up south Auckland-based Turiki Healthcare into a major Maori provider. His nephew Willie Jackson says his uncle battled cancer for several years. "He's been an amazing fighter and he fought the cancer perhaps how he approached life. He was a bloke who never gave up on a kaupapa and so he fought this right to his last breath," Mr Jackson says. Syd Jackson's body will be taken back to Hastings for burial. No reira e te rangatira, moe mai, moe mai, takoto mai.
|