MANGAWHAI'S NO.1 NEWSPAPER
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Ed Said - Like a game of last man standingI met some overseas visitors a month ago who couldn’t understand our fervour over elections. Sure, every country has them but the majority accept there will be candidates, some will be elected, and life will go on. If we take a good look at ourselves that’s really just what happens here. We see riots and protests from overseas, streets clogged with protesters over various issues, but they are actually only a very small proportion of populations that measure many times greater than ours and only serve as 6 o’clock fodder for our inept and inadequate television service. Jousting continues to find a victor in our own elections. We see NZ First trooping from one side of the Beehive to the other with a stern Winston flanked by a bunch of serious-looking lap dogs, most of whom, including their leader, failed to win a seat. I said last issue Winston must go with National but on reflection there are other possibilities. Though it’s a little simplistic, Bill English could well have offered James Shaw and the Greens the world. Shaw, Minister for the Environment, the promise we would all brush our teeth with baking soda, put organic milk in our Fair Trade coffee, plant a tree and, bingo! He could then tell Winston, ‘Sorry buddy, all sorted. You can go lie on the beach at Whananaki.’ Then, following the sudden resignation of the Kaipara CEO we now have the unexpected resignation of the Mayor. While he says ‘for personal reasons’ there is little doubt that conspiracy theories will fly from the usual quarters. I personally hope Gent doesn’t reveal the reasons for his resignation. He also has a private life and we don’t own him. Given my scenario above, this would leave the door open for Winston to become Kaipara Mayor. After all, he told us recently he walked five miles to and from school in bare feet, milked cows by hand, has been a lawyer, primary school teacher and secondary teacher and has been in politics for 40 years and twice in the last 12 months promised Mangawhai people he’d “get your money back.” Surely the ideal person to get Kaipara back on the rails. Perhaps Bruce Rogan might stand again, win the Mayoralty and take Kaipara where he always reckoned it should go – into receivership. Not too many years ago there were intense talks about a unitary body governing Kaipara and the North. ‘The debt’ see-saws between being Kaipara’s debt or Mangawhai’s debt. With the prospect of becoming a part of Whangarei there was heated discussion on how this should be handled as it didn’t belong to the people of Whangarei. I have it on good authority that a plan had been devised whereby the debt would, in time, simply ‘disappear’. Call it selective accounting or whatever. However the gallant people of Kaipara voted against the idea of becoming part of Whangarei preferring to cling to their sinking ship. Perhaps it’s time for these talks to be re-visited. A change of boundaries doesn’t change where our allegiance lies. If Kaipara, as such, disappeared, the Godwits would still fly back to the same beach. Though cliché’s are often seen as a cop-out, this might be a good time to seriously consider major change because if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got. Just my opinion. Rob |