Source: Radio New Zealand
Immigration Minister Erica Stanford. RNZ / Mark Papalii
A Pasifika leader who lived through the Dawn Raids is accusing the government of scaremongering about overstayer numbers.
Immigration Minister Erica Stanford told reporters there were “tens of thousands more” overstayers than she had expected last month.
“We have a big overstayer problem, tens of thousands more than we suspected, and we have to arm [immigration officers] with the tools to be able to request information from people when they have a reasonable suspicion that they are in breach of their visa conditions.”
Stanford made the comments in the context of the coalition giving immigration officers the power to ask suspected overstayers for identification in homes and workplaces.
RNZ wasn’t able to verify the “tens of thousands more” overstayers figure.
Immigration New Zealand confirmed there were around 20,980 people overstayers as of 1 July 2025 and approximately 14,000 in 2017 – a difference of just under 7000 over eight years.
Stanford has since backtracked.
“I meant to say when I was down on the tiles with all your microphones in front of me ‘thousands’. The figure that we always had in mind was around about in the low teens.
“When it came in at 20 [thousand], that is a significant amount more than we expected. So apologies that I misspoke. It happens on occasion. It wasn’t quite right.”
Tongan community leader Pakilau Manase Lua. RNZ Pacific / Lydia Lewis
Tongan community leader Pakilau Manase Lua’s was a child when his family came to New Zealand in the 1970s and lived through the Dawn Raids.
He attended the government apology for the raids as an adult and said Stanford’s comments took him back in time.
“It smacks of what the National Party did back in the ’70s with Robert Muldoon’s Dancing Cossacks and all of those racially motivated cartoons that they put up on the TV to scare New Zealanders into thinking that there’s a big groundswell of Polynesians when the actual majority of overstayers back then were were not Pacific at all.
“We made up less than a third of the actual overstayed numbers and my suspicion is that’s the case here but unfortunately this gaslighting that the government’s doing is going to be disproportionately targeting our people again.
“In an election year, this smacks of government putting the boot into the most vulnerable communities again and it’s not on.
“There was an apology done by previous government about the Dawn Raids and then we saw that they were actually still dawn raiding our people and unfortunately it’s always people of colour that end up being the people under the bus as the bus runs us over again and again.”
The Greens – highly critical of the legislation Stanford is handling – have seized on the minister’s error.
The party’s immigration spokesperson, Ricardo Menéndez March, accused her of fudging the numbers.
Ricardo Menéndez March. RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
“She is using Trump-like tactics to fearmonger the community over the number of overstayers and creating a narrative that was simply not correct nor true to justify a bill that will give Immigration New Zealand more powers.
“It’s her responsibility to be correct when talking about the number of overstayers. Claiming that there’s tens of thousands more, it’s not just irresponsible, it shows that this minister will go [to] any lengths to justify a bill that will pave the path towards what we’ve seen in the US.”
Stanford has previously said the proposed change was narrow in scope and “very different” from powers available to US immigration officers.
On the overstayer figures, she stressed she had made a genuine mistake – and has apologised.
“I was on the tiles and I made a mistake and I’m very sorry about that. I’ve apologised. It was a lot more than we expected but I think the Greens are making an enormous mountain out of a very small mole hole.
“The point is that we have a number of overstayers and we need to make sure that we’re taking action where necessary to make sure that we are ensuring that we’re following through with deportation, especially in cases where there are criminals who are overstaying their visas.”
Lua has not been convinced by her explanation.
“No I don’t accept that at all. Someone in her position should know better, should know her facts, and again, this is going to have detrimental impacts on the most vulnerable, and in this case, our communities.
“Time and time again, we become political footballs during an election year, and this quacks like a duck, walks like a duck.”
Immigration New Zealand said the latest overstayer estimate of around 20,980 people as of 1 July 2025 was produced using newly adopted methodology, which had significantly enhanced the accuracy of the estimate since the previous in 2017.
A spokesperson said the two figures couldn’t be directly compared because of the different methodologies used.
It was important to note that the number of people who have overstayed their visa was very small in comparison to the number of people who travel to New Zealand lawfully each year, they said.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/immigration-minister-erica-stanford-apologises-after-inflating-overstayer-figures/