Ngaire Fuata

Ngaire Fuata has had a wide-ranging career, from presenter, producer and chart-topping singer, to fitness instructor. The Whakatane local started her screen career at TVNZ in the late 1980s, as a secretary in the Māori and Pacific Programmes department. While working there, her cover of 'To Sir with Love' hit number one. In the early 90s Fuata began presenting for Tagata Pasifika, and later produced it. She was one of the founders of SunPix, which took over production of Tagata Pasifika in 2015. Fuata returned in front of the camera for 2011 autobiographical documentary Salat se Rotuma - Passage to Rotuma.

I was still swimming around, doing all sorts. It wasn't until I started working on Tagata Pasifika that I thought, 'Yes, this is what I want to do'. Ngaire Fuata, in an interview with blog Truths She Wrote, 20 August 2017