“To start is easy, to persist is art (German proverb).” Mid-week of May, we went to Wellington. The occasion was to support Francisco B. Hernandez, the first Filipino Green Party Member of Parliament who was making his inaugural speech.

We’ve always called him Kiko, our family’s term of endearment and a shortened version of Francisco. I’ve known him since birth, the eldest son of my wife’s brother. He always had this passion for history, politics, and current events, even at a very early age! He liked to read books and watched documentaries, while living the ordinary life of a young Pinoy grade-schooler. I can still picture him riding a tricycle (motorized pedicab) on his way to school. He was very close to my eldest child, Jessica (a closeness that they have kept until today). He was also the gregarious boy, joining in the parlour games during Christmas reunions of the family.
Francisco B. Hernandez is the second Filipino MP to become a member of the New Zealand Parliament. He is Filipino-born who migrated when he was 12 years old. He graduated from the University of Otago with a Bachelor of Arts in Politics, completed a Masters degree in Entrepreneurship, and was elected President of the Otago University Students Association. His campaign video parody, Frangnamstyle, was quite innovative. During his term he was instrumental in the implementation to deliver free breakfasts for students using surplus food. In so doing he was able to address student poverty while also reducing food waste.
Kiko’s public service career included working as a policy advisor to former Green Party MP Denise Roche, staff at ACC and the Tertiary Education Commission, as well as joining the Climate Change Commission to work on sustainable waste usage. He was one of the youth leaders selected for the New Zealand Youth Delegation to the Paris Climate Talks in 2015. Prior to being elected to Parliament, he was the chief climate change advisor of the Otago Regional Council.
According to his profile in the Green Party page, Fran as his Kiwi friends calls him, “brings his passion for climate change issues and his background in political activism and the public service to the Green Party Caucus. His portfolios for now are: Emergency Management and Recovery, Tertiary Education, and Public Services. As the first progressive Filipino-Kiwi MP, Fran is passionate about standing up for public services, protecting the role of tertiary education as a public good, and supporting emergency management and response work to protect people and nature from climate change and other natural disasters.”
My family went to Wellington last 23 May 2024, to witness his maiden speech in the Beehive. I guess it was also the collective highlight of his immediate family, as we saw with our very own eyes, someone whom we personally know, stand up and deliver a very meaningful speech. Every word, every moment, was especially heartfelt for us migrants. I, we, could feel the pain and the joy of how it is to be a migrant in our beloved Aotearoa New Zealand. I mentioned to him during the intimate family dinner after his speech that he made us all cry. And I know that’s what he did to his family in the Philippines and other parts of Mother Earth.
All the best Kiko, may God’s Blessings be upon you always!