Gerry Otimi Was Taking People's Money 25 Years Ago

In yesterday's blog I discussed how I came to cross paths with Gerry Otimi, currently in the news for what the media are calling 'an immigration scam'. Today I will explain how Gerry took money for Breakdance contests way back in 1984, claimed it was all for the kids, but the kids never seemed to see much of it themselves.

25 years ago I was running the nation's first Breakdance contests at Auckland's YMCA, charging $4 entry, and giving away $1,000-$1,500 in cash prizes EACH NIGHT. Around the same time Gerry Otimi convinced the Auckland City Council to spend $4,000 on a mobile stage that would be wheeled out onto Aotea Square on Friday nights so the streetkids could "do their Bop". I had no problem with that, but Gerry seemed to have a problem with me.

Every week Gerry was running heats on his Aotea Stage with teams competing for the mana of winning, and a trophy (the Otimi Cup!) that they had to give back at the next contest final. So pretty soon the breakdance crews were all coming to my bi-monthly contests to win cash money. Gerry then told the crews involved in his thing that they couldn't be involved in my thing, and that if they did they would be banned from his thing.

It got quite heavy, because there was a Church angle involved. Which Church I'm not sure but some of the kids were very conflicted. I vividly recall one kid telling me that he knew I was not the devil (because he knew me) but that he'd been told I was evil and warned to keep away from me. He was so angst-ridden he was almost crying.

It was silly.

So it kind of developed into an 'Us & Them' situation, with us (those not alligned with Gerry) promenading up one side of Queen Street and them on the other. (By way of backround: I was hanging out with the various crews on Queen Street every Friday and Saturday night, at any given time there were also 200-300 kids wandering around waiting to see if there was going to be a b-boy battle or not. They were f@#king good times!!)

Gerry told The Sunday News (26/2/1984) that I was 'exploiting the bop kids'. Funnily enough he went to the media with these accusations at the very same time that he decided to run his own breakdance contests at the YMCA and to also charge admission. But Gerry was doing it for altruistic reasons! He told the Sunday News that the money raised from his bop contests went into the coffers of the United Youth Society, an organisation he set up with a building society. (The United Building Society, now defunct).

"All the money we raise goes in there and it's controlled by the building society. It's only spent on helping the kids - if they need uniforms for their bop teams, we get money out" said Gerry in the Sunday News article.

Well, that's not actually how it turned out. A few months later I joined* a group of about 30 people (breakdancers and their parents) at the Head Office of the United Building Society in Greys Avenue, Auckland, as answers were sought about the finances of the United Youth Society. Everyone wanted to know where the money was, since they felt Gerry owed them for all the contests, shows, and tours they'd been on.

We were ushered into a conference room and some big-wig at the United Building Society explained that all they had done was set up a Savings Account for the United Youth Society - they had NOT set up any sort of charitable trust and certainly weren't in charge of administering it. They said they had given him $30,000 in sponsorship for his National Breakdance Tour. They were disappointed to learn that Gerry had charged admission into these contests since they had been under the impression these were to be free community events. They said they had no control over the account, they were not Trustees, it was just a simple Savings Account and it was Gerry who had authority to deposit and withdraw monies. Which he had, since there was nothing left in the account.

And that was pretty much the end of it. We left the meeting even more disgruntled but with little option for redress. Gerry had packed up his tent and gone. Where the money went no-one knew, but as far as the various Crews were concerned it hadn't been spent on them. They'd been taken to various parts of NZ (anywhere Otimi had family to run the events for him, I was told), stayed on Marae, watched Gerry collecting loadsa money at the door, and listened to his assurances that it was all going to the United Youth Society and they would all benefit at the end of the day.

I have no doubt that Gerry would say (yes, I'm making assumptions) that the monies received were all koha (donations), that he never benefited personally, and that most of the money was spent on 'administration'. (How much of that 'administration' was spent with relatives staging the various competitions around the country I guess we'll never know). It's the same line he's using now, to explain the money he's taken from Pacific Island overstayers.

I'd also agree that Gerry gave a lot of kids an opportunity to get up on stage and do their thing, and receive the mana and accolades that came with it. I felt I was doing the same with my competitions, the difference being that I was handing out big cash prizes on the night (something the Crews wanted) rather than holding onto it and promising to dole it out later thru some 'Youth Society'.

I kept various Newspaper clippings about Breakdancing, and if you're interested click on the links above. (BTW - back in the 80s we had two daily newspapers: The NZ Herald in the morning, and The Auckland Star in the afternoon). One clipping you won't see is the letter I wrote to the NZ Herald detailing concerns about Gerry Otimi, because it was never published. I'll post that letter in my next blog, it makes interesting reading.

*NB: I was at this meeting because I had just become the manager of The Megazoids (NZ Breakdance Champions) who had been taken on tour by Gerry and returned home with nothing. They had felt hard done by.

Gerrard Otimi - I knew him first!!

From Gerry Otimi 19/06/09 1:30 PM

Gerrard Otimi was the top story on the Evening news on both TV networks last night, when it emerged he was the man charging Pacific Island overstayers $500 to stamp their Passports to give them New Zealand citizenship - thereby allowing them to stay in this country.
Well, that's what they thought he was doing but Gerry says otherwise. He says he was merely 'adopting' them into his 'whanau' and offering to help them in their quest for citizenship. Stamping their passports and issuing them with an official (but not) looking citizenship certificate was merely ... Well, I didn't hear his answer on that.

I'll let the Police decide whether he's broken any laws, but knowing Gerry as I do, I'm pretty sure he'll wriggle his way out of it.

My run in with Gerry came back in 1984 when I was promoting Breakdance competitions in Auckland. I held the first competition in 1983 at the Auckland YMCA in December and it was huge success. Up until then kids had been breaking/bopping (yes, that's what it was called back then despite revisionists now claiming they were always B-Boys) in the streets and in Auckland there was much consternation from Queen Street retailers about the kids dancing in shop fronts.

I solved that problem by booking the YMCA, putting up $1000 in prize money (a huge sum back then) and charging kids $4 entry ($15 for families of 6). It was MASSIVE!! We packed the place out and it was a great night. History was made, you should have been there. But you were white so probably missed it, right?

Anyway, I was clearly on to something and started organising more competitions. Gerry knew I was on to something too, and started a rival competition. But by virtue of being Maori and calling himself a youth worker (but he ran a calendar business) he went one better. He bent the ear of Auckland Mayor Cath Tizzard and got the council to fund a special stage for breakdancing in Aotea Square.

Good on him, I thought, and off he went -- holding free competitions every Friday and Saturday night in Aotea Square on his council funded stage. I continued with my plans to hold further competitions, and even a national competition.

The problem came in February 1984 when The Sunday News rang to tell me that Gerry had called me a Pakeha rip-off merchant and what did I think of that? Turns out Gerry had decided he too wanted to run competitions at the YMCA and charge people admission; but he had a problem: me.

By now I was giving away $1200 a night in prizemoney (and later $1500) but he was only giving away a trophy. A trophy named after him, and one you only got to keep until the next competition he held. With his new competition he would give away some cash ($350) but the rest would be for The United Youth Trust. We were all led to believe this was a charitable trust but as it later turned out (see Part Two) that was not correct.

So naturally I had to defend myself to The Sunday News and they got their story. There is a snap shot of it below but you can read a full page copy of it by clicking here. (Oh, BTW, I went by my real name back then, so now you know). Obviously there's a lot more to this story (complete with clippings about Gerry Otimi and the money he took from the breakdancers) so come back tomorrow for Part Two....

From Gerry Otimi 19/06/09 1:30 PM