A south Auckland local politician is calling it a wrap, resigning after more than 30 years of service.
Anne Candy (ties to Ngāi Te Tangi/Ngāti Mahanga/Ngāti Wairere/Ngāti Whāwhākia of Waikato-Tainui) from the Manurewa Local Board, 80, resigned this month.
Manurewa-Papakura Ward Councillor Daniel Newman said he will miss his friend.
“There are not many of us who haven’t benefited from her gentle manner, when she would look at you and smile and say, ‘is that what you think’, or ‘you could look at it this way’,” Newman said.
“She has this way that even when correcting you, you walk away feeling you’ve accomplished things rather than been admonished, and I certainly hope I have her energy and passion at her age.”
Local board chair Matt Winiata said it would be difficult to replace her experience.
“No one gives the length of service she has without a passion for people,” Winiata said in a statement.
“The community that first elected her all those years ago is different to the one today, but she was returned election after election, proof that she could span generations, cultures and political divides.”
Candy was elected to the Manukau City Council in 1995, serving as deputy mayor from 1998 to 2007. She chaired its environmental hearings committee, before becoming a local board member.
She continued to expand her service in the community, serving on the Counties Manukau District Health Board from 2008 to 2010, on a maternity care review in 2012, and the Anglican Church as Bishop’s Commissary to Te Pihopa o Te Tai Tokerau from 2002 to 2023.
Her service to Māori and local government was recognised in the King’s Birthday Honours this year when she was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit - an award that comes on top of her earlier Queen’s Service Order.
Candy was a tireless advocate for Māori in education, health, housing, te reo, cultural heritage and the well being of tamariki.
Working with her friend, the late Rose Whaiapu, she set up the Taonga Education Centre Charitable Trust in 2005 to ensure young women did not have to quit school if they had babies.
“Manurewa has the highest population of young Māori in the country," Candy said.
“They don’t want an 80-year-old making decisions for them,” she told Te Ao Māori News earlier this year.
Despite that, she said offering care and educational opportunities to young mums was her most rewarding work.
“I never walked alone. I had special role models and mentors from many wonderful ethnicities, and they all remain in my karakia today.”
Candy’s resignation falls within 12 months of the next election, so the board must decide at its November meeting to either appoint a new member or leave it vacant.
LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
