Speech by New Zealand Ambassador to China Tony Browne(Excerpts)

We are here today in the Great Hall of the People to honour the memory of a very distinguished New Zealander.It was in this building that milestones in Rewi’s life were marked―his 80th birthday when Deng Xiaoping, who had had dealings with Rewi dating back some forty years, hosted the party.And it was here that his memory was honoured on the hundredth anniversary of his birth.

In this Hall, in which major moments in the history of modern China have been observed, it is appropriate that we again honour someone who did so much to help build modern China.

Rewi spent more of his life in China than he did in New Zealand.His greatest achievements were here in China.But he is nonetheless honoured in New Zealand as a great New Zealander.

Rewi’s very name, the name of one of the great figures in Maori history, linked him to a proud tradition in New Zealand―of being a fighter, of bravery, leadership, willingness to confront authority, of respect for tradition and of honouring cultural values.

Rewi had all those qualities.As a young man he fought in terrible conditions in Europe in the First World War: he endured the hardships of trench warfare, he was injured, and carried the scars of that war for the rest of his life.From that experience he began to form ideas that shaped his future life and thinking―ideas about politics and international relations, about fairness and respect for one’s fellow human beings, regardless of race, background or status.He came to question the view, still widely held in New Zealand at that time, that empires and military alliances provided a blueprint for the future.

Initially he used his strength and determination to try to develop one of New Zealand’s harshest areas for farming. It helps explain, perhaps, why he felt so much at home years later battling nature in Gansu.

His experience of farming in New Zealand brought out attributes of persistence and a tolerance of hardship.It gave him a sense of identity with those who struggle to earn a living from the land.It taught him that those who work in the most difficult circumstances need spirit and determination, that they must be prepared to live with failure and not give up, they must learn from it and be willing to start again.By the time Rewi came to China he had well and truly imbued in him that spirit of human tenacity.

History’s judgement of Rewi is one that is, and will continue to be, strongly positive.It will acknowledge his humanity, it will.It will honour his scholarship for we must not forget that Rewi was not only a fighter, a builder, and educationalist.He had a hunger for learning about the land he lived in.The library he built, the collection of cultural treasures he built up, the poetry he wrote and the classics he translated for the benefit of a western audience.The soldier and farmer with little formal education became a scholar.

I will leave others to recall Rewi’s achievements in Shanghai, in flood relief, behind the Japanese lines with the Red Army, in the Gung Ho movement, and later the work he did at Shandan in Gansu. It was practical, it developed work skills that China needs today, it pointed to the need to develop China’s west, so loudly echoed in the policies of China’s government today.It is a record that has inspired many. In 1986 New Zealand’s Prime Minister, David Lange, came to Beijing and called on Rewi.There have been many great sons of New Zealand, he said to him, “but you, Sir, are our greatest son”.

So Rewi is a man that two nations are proud to claim, and to share as their own. His legacy is something on which those two nations have been able to draw on as we have built our modern relationship over the past 35 years.In his later life he enjoyed nearly 15 years when New Zealand had the government presence here in China that he had argued for decades we needed to have.

Those of us who knew him in that period recall the generosity of time, advice and encouragement he gave us.Those who came later can only admire a life of huge achievement.

So we all today, Chinese and New Zealanders alike; those who knew Rewi personally and those who know him by repute, his family and his friends, we join in acknowledging the memory of a great son of New Zealand and of China.