"There are Pacific people who find it difficult to stand tall ...because of that, to live a full life carrying this burden."
Toleafoa tells The Detail about his own experiences as a teenager living in Auckland's Ponsonby in the '70s, being randomly checked by the police as he walked down the street, detained without reason and abused. The raids and random checks, he says, were "state sanctioned racism, state sanctioned terror".
RNZ / Moera Tuilaepa-Taylor
Four of the founding Polynesian Panthers (L-R): Alec Toleafoa, Tigilau Ness, Melani Anae, and Will 'Ilolahia.
He also talks of the role of the Polynesian Panthers Party helping Pacific communities survive, and the legacy of the Dawn Raids today. Toleafoa is part of a collective that is negotiating an apology by the government.