A long time ago
(March?) there were Dutch elections and I duly voted, and after the
first exciting exit polls and results, it took literary forever until
a government was formed (last week? Details still ongoing?).
Late September we
had elections in New Zealand, and as permanent residents we were
allowed to vote. NZ politics were shaken up by the phenomenon of
“Jacinda-mania”, the sudden rise of Labour leader Jacinda Ardern.
Jacinda is my age, she is very dynamic and enthusiastic, and she
caused a very exciting few weeks in which the polls had her almost
50-50 with the National party, who have been in power for the last 9
years. Unfortunately, she didn't manage to get more votes/seats than
National, but National also didn't get a majority, and so the smaller
party NZ First had to decide whether to form a coalition with
National, or with Labour and the Greens. This lasted 12 days. I'm
generally not a fan of political parties that have “First” in
their name, so this didn't look good.
In the meantime
Germany had elections as well, and that outcome promised quite
difficult coalition discussions, still ongoing.
So for about 2
weeks, Thomas and me shared between us 3 countries without a
government, which we thought quite interesting.
Yesterday NZ First
announced their chosen coalition partner. First they spoke about how
New Zealand had had to wait a historically long time of 12 days
before the coalition was announced. Then he made jokes (?) on how
poor Germany wouldn't have a government until in December, which
quite confused everyone in NZ, why are we concerned about Germany?!
And I was not sure why 12 days were such a long time, being used to
countries like the Netherlands and Belgium, taking 100's of days to
get things sorted out.
Anyway, the good
news was, rather unexpectedly I think, that Labour, NZ First and the
Greens will be in power for the next 3 years in NZ. Earlier that day
the news had announced that NZ is one of the highest greenhouse gas
emitters per capita of the developed world, an alarming report came
out that NZ is facing very serious and imminent climate change
issues, and that NZ's unique flora and fauna are threatened by
extinction. We were soo relieved that the new government will
actually care about those things. Jacinda was the first political person the
whole day, in her first speech, to say something about the
environment and I was jumping up and down with joy. Finally a
sensible person in power!
Also, Thomas and me
realized that of those 3 countries, New Zealand will now be the one
with a government that most reflects our beliefs, so for us this is a
sign that we chose the right country to live in. Now let's clean up
those rivers and protect the environment!
