Warning
This post contains HURTY words and BLUNT opinions.
If you prefer your political commentary to be respectful and gentle
then this post is definitely NOT for you.
Mark Darrow, the sneaky leaker of NZTA papers and Botany electorate chair, has been fighting off disgruntled members in the Botany electorate. They are upset by his overbearing attitude to the selection. There is a growing belief that he is working in cahoots with Regional Chair Andrew Hunt to try and force a head office candidate onto the members.
He banned any members from outside the electorate from attending ‘meet the candidate’ meetings, even banning the neighbouring electorate chair. He also banned MPs and they are not best pleased about it.
While running around banning people, he has also been conducting a witch-hunt to try and discover who is leaking to us. He’d be better off asking who isn’t.
While he’s been doing that, the five candidates have been drinking vast amounts of tea visiting voting delegates. This is a torture test and one the corporate honchos won’t be at all familiar with.
That’s probably why Christopher Luxon is busily telling the little old dears and other delegates that he doesn’t really need this job (Botany MP) as he’s got loads of really good offers elsewhere. One caller to the tip line quipped that he’d best run along to those other offers then if that is his attitude. I’m also not sure that constantly referring to yourself during your own speech as a “leader” rather than a CEO is working for him either.
Of course the fact that he says that, shows his tone-deafness to the concerns of the electorate and highlights that he is just doing this to add to his CV. He is basically telling the delegates that if he doesn’t like doing the hard yards for constituents, he can always pack it in and go and do something else.
On the other hand, all the other offers mean that the nastiest campaign ever is likely to get even nastier, so that the cost is too high for him to want to carry on.
One wise old salt in the party shared the thought with us that if Christopher Luxon doesn’t win it on the first ballot, then he won’t win it at all.
If Katrina Bungard and Agnes Loheni were smart, they’d form a pact for each of their supporters to give the other candidate their second preferences and therefore lock out the two bald guys and the parking attendant with the weaselly face.
The over-arching feeling coming out of Botany though, is that head office is trying to do a stitch-up and if there is one thing the independently minded delegates don’t like, it is being told what to do. It is very rare for a stitch up to work. The National party selection system rarely fails, and when it does, the blame can be fairly sheeted home to the head office wallies trying to impose their will on the electorate.
