The daughter of Pa George Karika, she was educated at St Joseph Primary School and at Avarua School before becoming a sales assistant at the Cook Islands Trading Company.[1] Following the death of her elder sister in 1928, she became an aide to her grandmother, Karika Takau Ariki.[1] In 1942 she married Ernest Teiho Taripo.[1]
Her father became Makea Karika Ariki in 1942, and she succeeded to the title following his death in May 1949.[1] On succeeding to the title she was appointed to the Rarotonga Island Council, on which she served until self-government in 1965.[1] As a member of the council, she was elected to the Legislative Assembly in the 1958 general elections,[2] on which she served until 1961. She became an inaugural member of the House of Ariki in 1967, and served as its vice-president during its first term. She served as President of the House of Ariki from 1978 to 1980, and again from 1990 to 1992.[3]
Karika served as president of The Girl Guides Cook Islands Association for six years, and patroness of the Cook Islands National Council of Women. In 1996 she became a patroness of the Te Ipukarea Society. She was landowner of the Takitumu Conservation Area and committed to conservation, helping to transfer endangered Rarotonga monarch birds to Atiu in 2002,[4] and leading protest marches against purse seining in 2016.[5]
On her death in September 2017 she was given a state funeral.[6] She was succeeded as Makea Karika Ariki by George Taripo Karika Ariki.[7]
