OPINION: The race for the keys to the Invercargill mayoral office and car (and a big, expensive, carbon dioxide spewing, not-particularly safe in comparison to other cars, beast of a gangsta-wagon it is) is starting to generate some interest.
The incumbent, newly-knighted Sir Timothy Shadbolt, once the rebel of a thousand causes (providing those causes were disrupting society) and now firmly ensconced in the establishment, is wanting to extend his record of being the longest running (or driving in the gangsta-wagon) mayor in New Zealand.
Just why we Invercargillites think that being around for a while is a particularly appealing quality in a mayor when we might have someone who is competing for the title of the best mayor in New Zealand is a mystery, but we have bought into the rhetoric that longevity is better than any other quality.
The knighted one likes a good fight and given that he believes that he is entitled to be mayor, fight he will. Entitled? Well, yes, it appears so. When deputy mayor (currently, but probably not for long) Rebecca Amundsen had the temerity to announce that she was going to stand for mayor, when the mayor was in Wellington fighting the good fight for SIT, he was incensed at her deviousness. It didn’t matter that she had tried to contact him for a couple of days to advise him that she was going to run for office, and he ignored her messages; this was an act of downright disloyalty.
One would expect that the longest-running mayor in Aotearoa would have some respect for the democratic process, and that includes the right of the deputy mayor to throw her hat in the ring.
Shadbolt has a history of firing seemingly loyal and hard-working deputies. While Amundsen is absolutely loyal and hard-working, Shadbolt displays the same attitude towards loyalty as North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong-un does – loyalty means blind loyalty to the leader. Fortunately for Amundsen, she is in Invercargill and not Pyongyang, where an act of perceived disloyalty would result in her permanent disappearance.
Councillor Rangi Pottinger would face a fate worse than disappearance if he criticised the leadership skills of Rocket Man as he did Shadbolt. Saying that the longest-serving mayor in the country is not doing his job might be honest but will not earn him many invitations to share in the festivities when the council visits the museum (on no, that’s tight it’s closed) or the water tower (ditto) or Anderson Park (ditto), or the Chinese Garden (it might open sometime), or to view the Christmas lights (if they are going), or when they have a coffee at The Auction House (and contemplate the $4.5 million budget blow-out on the building). Could Pottinger have a point?
In October, will we continue to buy-in to the politics of personality and bring back Tim because he fights the good fight (preferably with a just cause but any old fight will do) and gets us publicity (although this is usually just a reflection as Brand Shadbolt hogs the limelight) and fesses up to mistakes (which good judgment would prevent); or will we elect someone who will be a hard-working, full-time mayor who will provide vision and leadership so the council will become functional and effective for a change?
Invercargillite, Dave Rohan.
Bio: Business background, has served as chair of SIT Council and President of Southland Chamber of Commerce, business tutor.
28 March 2019
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