Sam Lotu-Iiga

Peseta Samuelu Masunu "Sam" Lotu-Iiga (born 2 November 1970) is a former member of the New Zealand Parliament for the Maungakiekie electorate, having been elected in the 2008 election. Lotu-Iiga was one of two National Party Pasifika MPs. Lotu-Iiga holds the Samoan high chiefly title of Peseta.

Lotu-Iiga was born in Apia, Samoa in 1970. In 1973, Lotu-Iiga and his family moved to New Zealand as a child. He grew up in Māngere, South Auckland and attended Mangere Central Primary School. He then studied at Auckland Grammar School and the University of Auckland, where he earned an MCom(Hons) and a BCom/LLB. He also studied at the University of Cambridge where he earned an MBA.

While studying, Lotu-Iiga worked as an intern at the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and in the Samoan Ministry of Land, Surveys and Environment. After graduating he joined Russell McVeagh McKenzie Bartleet in Auckland as a solicitor, working in the area of corporate and commercial law.

Lotu-Iiga later migrated to Britain, where he worked for Bankers Trust as a financial analyst. While at Cambridge, Lotu-Iiga played rugby for the New Zealand Barbarians. Lotu-Iiga moved to Sydney and worked as an executive consultant with Macquarie Bank. Later, he returned to New Zealand to work as a management consultant and adviser.

Lotu-Iiga stood on the Citizens & Ratepayers' ticket for a seat on the Auckland City Council during the 2007 Auckland local body election in the Tamaki-Maungakiekie ward. Following his successful election, Lotu-Iiga was appointed Chairman of the City Development Committee on the Council under Mayor John Banks.

In February 2008 Lotu-Iiga put his name forward for the National Party selection for the Maungakiekie electorate. That month, incumbent Labour Party MP Mark Gosche, who held a majority of over 6,000 votes, announced he would stand down from the seat in the forthcoming general election. In April Lotu-Iiga defeated two other National Party nominees for the selection on the first ballot.^{[citation needed]}

While the electoral boundaries for Maungakiekie had changed, removing Ōtāhuhu, the new boundary included the new suburbs of Royal Oak, Onehunga and Point England, which were considered^{[by whom?]} to heavily favour the Labour Party.^{[citation needed]} Gosche's large majority meant that Maungakiekie was still considered a safe Labour seat.

Lotu-Iiga ran a high-profile campaign, capitalising on his high name-recognition as a City Councillor, and heavily engaged in grass-roots campaigning, including door-knocking the electoral district. On election night, Lotu-Iiga beat Labour List MP Carol Beaumont by a margin of 1,942 votes in what was one of the largest electoral swings in the country. Lotu-Iiga became one of three National Party candidates in the Auckland region to claim a seat from Labour, along with Nikki Kaye in Auckland Central and Paula Bennett in Waitakere. In his first parliamentary term, Lotu-Iiga served as the Deputy-Chairperson of the Commerce Committee and as a member of the Finance and Expenditure Committee.