HONOLULU (Aug 25, 2026) — The Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) joins the ʻohana, friends, students, and community of Kamaki Kanahele III in mourning his passing and honoring a lifetime devoted to the well-being of the Hawaiian people and all of Hawaiʻi.
Kanahele served OHA during its formative years as its first Administrator, helping to give direction and substance to the kuleana entrusted to the institution. He later returned to serve the lāhui as an OHA Trustee-at-Large from 1990 through 1994. In both capacities, he embraced OHA’s mission to build a strong, healthy, and thriving Hawaiian people and lāhui.
“Kamaki Kanahele belonged to a generation of courageous Hawaiian leaders who helped establish OHA and define its responsibility to our beneficiaries,” said OHA Board Chair Kaialiʻi Kahele. “He understood that OHA could not merely speak about the needs of our people; it had to listen to our communities, protect their interests, and act with courage on their behalf.”
As Administrator, Kanahele helped advance OHA’s work in education, health, economic opportunity, culture, land stewardship, and the pursuit of the revenues and resources rightfully due to Native Hawaiians. As a Trustee, he chaired OHA’s Committee on Education and Culture and carried community concerns involving Miloliʻi, traditional fishing practices, coastal development, and access before the Board. He also helped establish OHA’s Hawaiian Language Award at the Merrie Monarch Festival, recognizing the inseparable relationship between ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, hula, and the identity of our people.
Kanahele’s service extended far beyond OHA. His hula genealogy connected him to the traditions of renowned hula master Lōkālia Montgomery. As a longtime judge of the hula kahiko competitions at Hula ʻOni Ē, he brought cultural knowledge, discernment, and fidelity to the evaluation and perpetuation of traditional hula.
He was also a traditional Hawaiian healer and served for many years at the Dr. Agnes Kalanihoʻokaha Cope Center for Traditional Native Hawaiian Healing at the Waiʻanae Coast Comprehensive Health Center. Named for his mother, the revered Aunty Aggie Cope, the center perpetuates traditional practices including lomilomi, lāʻau lapaʻau, lāʻau kāhea, and hoʻoponopono. Through his leadership of the center and its Kūpuna Council, Kanahele helped preserve ancestral knowledge and ensure that it would be responsibly passed to future generations.
“Kamaki taught us that the health of our people cannot be separated from the health of our culture, our ʻāina, and our relationships with one another,” Kahele said. “His life was a powerful expression of aloha, kuleana, and service. Although we mourn his passing, the ʻike he protected, the institutions he strengthened, and the people he guided remain living expressions of his legacy.
“Kahele and members of the OHA Board of Trustees joined the Kanahele ʻohana and community in paying their respects. OHA presented a memorial wreath in gratitude for Kanahele’s distinguished service to the organization and the lāhui.
E moe mālie, e Kamaki. Ua hala ʻoe, akā, e mau ana kāu mau hana aloha no ka lāhui.
(Photo credit: Mouna Farm and Arts & Cultural Village)
