FEDERATION
FOUNDATION
WHO WE ARE
Hui Kanaka Pōwāwae (Hawaiian Football) is a Maui-based nonprofit organization dedicated to representing Hawaiians on the global football (soccer) stage. Our team of experts is Hawaiian-led, possessing a wealth of knowledge and experience, understanding the work, the context, and challenges faced by the Hawaiian community.
WHERE WE COME FROM
Hawaiian Football kicked off its first league on Maui in 1975, when the President of Haleakala Dairy, Peter D. Baldwin, organized and sponsored 40 teams with the purchase of uniforms and equipment for 600 Maui youth.
Since 2010, Hawaiian Football grew to serve nearly 7,000 youth club soccer players across the 4 primary Hawaiian Islands—Kaua‘i, O‘ahu, Maui, and Hawai‘i Island—through indoor and outdoor leagues, state tournaments, and player identification events.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Hawaiian Football shifted to serve the most vulnerable and highly marginalized population in Hawaiʻi—the aboriginal population, often referred to as Native Hawaiians.
WHERE WE ARE GOING
OUR VISION
Our Vision leverages the unifying, educational, and humanitarian values intrinsic to global football, to create a strong Sporting Nation, rich in National Character and Identity, with Nā ‘Ālapa Hawai‘i (our National Teams) serving as 21st-century symbols of aloha ‘āina (love of country, love for Hawai‘i) and aloha kānaka (love of humanity, love for Hawaiians).
OUR MISSION
Our Mission seeks to create a space where Hawaiian National Identity can be recovered, rebuilt, collectively expressed, and shared on the global football stage.
OUR APPROACH
We form National Teams to showcase Hawaiian players; educate on Hawaiian national history, culture, and language; garner international attention, awareness, and support; and to share Hawaiian values with the international community—in dire need of aloha.
Our National Team Program is an innovative and unmatched approach, one that resonates far beyond the pitch. It is a quest for recognition and representation, harnessing the power of national and international sport.
OUR CORE VALUES
ALOHA
Aloha means love, kindness, affection, compassion, mercy, and grace. The meaning, however, goes infinitely further. True aloha honors one’s present and future, with an eye toward the past—that is the secret of aloha.
In the Hawaiian language, aloha ‘āina means “love of land,” but the secret of aloha unifies one’s history, ancestry, and chief purpose for the future. Armed with aloha ‘āina (“love of country”) and aloha kānaka (“love of humankind”) we embody the national pride and identity of Hawai‘i and Hawaiians—true aloha that never ends.
PONO
Pono means goodness and righteousness—it stands for truth, what is right, just, and fair. Nā pono lāhui kānaka means “human rights.” Me ka pono is a term used to convey “respect.”
Pono thoughts, words, and actions breed the moral qualities that define an upright character. It is a fundamental part of sport and is demanded in global society. There is, therefore, a need to be pono to produce the right kind of prosperity, well-being, and success — as individuals, as a team, and as a lāhui (country).