How stupid is the Boomer King’s allegations of South Auckland voter fraud when the Mayoralty was rigged for his benefit?

No. Fucking. way.

Mayor Wayne Brown called out on Auckland election voter fraud claim

An allegation of voting fraud in Otāhuhu during Auckland’s local body election leads to a demand the mayor front up with evidence.

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown says gathering up of ballot papers and multiple voting was “common in South Auckland” during last October’s elections, and claims to have video evidence to back it up.

But city politicians say he has provided nothing to back-up the claim and accused him of picking on southern voters.

Brown’s claim, in a council debate over postal voting vs setting up booths for the 2025 election, was rejected by others around the council table, with Deputy Mayor Desley Simpson trying to shut down his allegation as objections, including from Manukau councillor Lotu Fuli, rose.

Brown reacted by pressing on: “Oh well, we have got video of them in Otahuhu.”

As Simpson tried to intervene “Ahem… hey, hey, hey, hey,” trying to move on from Brown’s claim and then attempting to hold a vote to end the debate, Brown said: “I come from there, and so I’m criticising myself.”

The mayor was arguing against postal voting and for a restoration of walk-in booths for the next council election. “There are things that happen with postal voting. There are people who gather up whole areas of postal votes and … vote. And that’s common in South Auckland.”

However if people had to appear in person it would stop that activity. “If they have to show up, they have to show up. You’d have to show up as a voter.”

He said another issue was at postal boxes where “a whole lot of letters are biffed out – people collect them and vote.”

“Why not just have booth voting, and it’s a hell of a lot cheaper and the country survived on it for years and years. Postal voting is bloody expensive and pisses people off. Booth voting is infinitely cheaper. Postal voting has lots of problems because people do not live where they say they live.”

Brown’s claim of ballot gathering and unlawful voting – and singling out of South Auckland – have been criticised by his opponent for the mayoralty, Efeso Collins, who was a councillor for Manukau ward until 2022.

Let’s just try and unpack the latest fucking moronic thing the Boomer King has claimed and stack that up against the fact he was the one who benefitted from a rigged Mayoralty.

This debate was occurring as Auckland was confronted by the pitiful turn out from the last election and the manner in which it is rigged for that pitiful turnout by the private contractors who run the Auckland Mayoralty election rather than the Electoral Commission.

The argument was we needed two move away from mail in votes to actual voting booths the way we do for a national election.

Out of no where, the Boomer King claims we need to move to booths because those tricky South Aucklanders rig the electoral mail in ballots???

Cue stunned shocked silence and a Deputy Mayor desperate to move the meeting along before anyone realised the Mayor had just smeared the entire South Auckland electorate of being cheats!

The shocking irony of course is that it was the Boomer King who benefitted from a rigged election, not South Aucklanders!

Let’s remind ourselves how Mr Magoo got elected using a rigged election process and why it’s really bad for Auckland.

You heard me right, I said rigged election process.

I’d like to start by pointing out that I made the exact same criticisms about Goff’s win 3 years ago and argued that his paltry 35% turn out was no mandate and was symptomatic of a broken system!

Even if Efeso had won with the exact same levels of turnout, I would be as equally damning of the system that produced that result, DESPITE my candidate winning.

This is NOT a left wing or right wing issue, it may be a generational issue, a bit more about that later, but to champion and defend democratic infrastructure that produces such damaged results as this does would make Republicans who adopt voter suppression tactics in America blush.

Because that is ultimately what we are discussing here.

A broken system of engagement that has been allowed to rot on the vine.

My issue is that the local elections are subcontracted out to a private company who have a vested interest in low voter turns outs!

We are such a cheap arsed, deregulated basket case of a country, we sub contracted our democratic obligations to a private company who maximise their return if fewer people engage and cost less resource!

In the last week of voting, only 8 polling booths were open for a city of 1.2million.

Here they are.

Again, that is Republican tactics in Georgia level voter suppression right there.

So if I wasn’t enrolled to vote, the only place I could have voted was one of these 8 venues.

Central Auckland, Great Barrier Island, Henderson, Manukau, Orewa, Pukekohe, Waiheke and fucking Warkworth.

How the Christ does that list sound reasonable to anyone else?

I can not see how anyone attempting to defend Wayne Brown’s victory will look at 8 booths for 1.2million and pretend that a 35% turn out is a victory for democracy.

It isn’t.

It’s a victory for the private company who has this outrageous contract in the first place.

They run postal ballots because it is far cheaper, not because it engages the population.

As for the counter to the landed gentry having multiple votes around the country (many of whom are boomers), I’m well aware that the landed gentry don’t have multiple votes if they have multiple properties in the same Council, my point is they have multiple votes around the country, if they have properties in different Councils.

The Right will claim they pay rates in different councils, so they have the right to vote multiple times, but renters pay their rent with the cost of rates already built into that rent by the Landlord!

If a renter moves multiple times into different councils, they’ve paid rent that goes towards those rates but they sure as hell don’t get extra votes despite paying those rates in their rents!

I note this to show how the vested interests of the propertied landed gentry (many of whom are boomers) and how their interests are sacrosanct.

To damn an 18 year old without ID who bounces around from house to house and who has to get out to only 1 of 8 booths to cast a vote is churlish.

To blame beneficiaries who are constantly moving in the churn for not getting out to 1 of 8 booths to cast a vote is disconnected from that reality.

To criticise the poor and the apathetic for not being engaged enough to get out to Central Auckland, Great Barrier Island, Henderson, Manukau, Orewa, Pukekohe, Waiheke and fucking Warkworth is just so jaw dropping in its audacity, it’s difficult to take seriously.

Add to this Wayne Brown’s extraordinarily offensive allegation that actually it’s the South Aucklander’s who cheat the system and you can’t believe the audacity!

What are the solutions here?

I’ve been very clear.

Take the bloody contract off the private company and run it ourselves!

Run it with the same density of polling booths as a National election, a one day vote with 2 weeks of early voting.

There were 84 polling booths in 2020 for Auckland Central and Epsom electorates ALONE last election. That’s not city wide, that’s just the leafy burbs.

How can a handful of suburbs in the swanky part of town have 84 polling booths for the national election when there was only 8 for the entire city of 1.2million for the Mayoralty?

There is an outrageous imbalance of power here and attempting to defend a broken electoral system that has been subcontracted out for the cheapest outcome and call that vintage democratic wine is not acceptable.

Again, this isn’t a Left or Right issue, it’s a basic citizen issue.

Watching Brown claim this rigged system is actually the fault of South Auckland is just so extraordinarily offensive.

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