Pouvanaa a Oopa

Pouvanaa a Oopa (May 10, 1895 – January 10, 1977) was a French Polynesia politician and Tahitian nationalist, who led a Tahitian separatist movement against French rule, before being exiled to France in the late 1950s.

Tahitians and other French Polynesians refer to Pouvanaa as metua, which means "spiritual father." He remains an important symbol for the French Polynesian independence or autonomy movements.

Pouvanaa a Oopa was born in 1895 in Maeva, on the island of Huahine. His mother was of Polynesian descent while his father was a Danish sailor.

He was a veteran of World War I, serving in the French military. Pouvanaa also worked as a "fried-potato vendor" and a carpenter.

During World War II, Pouvanaa criticized people who profited financially from the war, and was placed under arrest in his native Huahine in 1942. Following the end of the war and the liberation of France, Pouvanaa continued to criticize French colonial rule in the islands.

He later founded his own political party, the Democratic Rally of the Tahitian People, in October 1947 which advocated Tahitian nationalism and an end to French colonial rule.

Pouvanaa was first elected as a deputy in the National Assembly of France in 1949, becoming the first French Polynesian to serve in the French Chamber of Deputies. He was further re-elected to the French National Assembly in 1952 and 1956, as part of an autonomy program for French Polynesia, which was known as the French Settlements in Oceania at the time.

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