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New Zealand should change its name to Aotearoa according to the nation's Māori Party who have launched a campaign to scrap its current 'colonialist' name.
Te Pāti Māori are asking for Indigenous names to be restored to the country, including the names of towns, cities and suburbs.
The party has set up a petition calling on the government to 'identify and officially restore' the original place names by 2026.
'It's well past time that Te Reo Māori was restored to its rightful place as the first and official language of this country,' Māori Party leaders, Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer said in a statement launching the petition.
Leaders of the Māori Party Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer (pictured) have launched a petition to restore New Zealand's place name to 'Aotearoa'
'We are a Polynesian country – we are Aotearoa.'
The petition urged the New Zealand government to do all that it can to 'restore the status of our language'.
'Tangata whenua are sick to death of our ancestral names being mangled, bastardised, and ignored. It's
