THREE KEY FACTS:
- The Greens leadership of its Pasifika roopu have resigned over the party’s treatment of its wāhine Māori and Pasifika MPs.
- They claim the Pasifika members were given little support or voice following the untimely death of Efeso Collins.
- They say its hypocritical that a Pākeha MP who abused a government MP in the debating chamber is still an MP, while Green Māori and Pasifika MPs are booted out for less.
I just want to say up front, as a good personal friend of Efeso for 30 years, I find it deeply distasteful that his memory is being invoked to justify this tantrum. The genuine grief every single Green Party member and MPs felt at his loss is profound and deep. To suggest that the Green’s leadership has anything but the deepest aroha and respect for Fes and his family is a deplorable slur.
Their response in all things has been his Family first.
There is not one single day that passes where we don’t ache at his loss. To suggest otherwise to score political points is egregious and disgusting.
What we are seeing here is the final flare out of one of the factions instrumental in the uber woke identity clique.
It was this lived experience clique who saw Marama as not woke enough and were behind the high ranking of Elizabeth Kerekere and all the shenanigans that occurred there as the uber woke clique gerrymandered the selection process of Identity Uber Alles.
In Collaborators, Episode one, Season 3 of Battlestar Galactica, those who have collaborated are secretly rounded up and sent out an airlock.
Once the scale of the uberwoke identity politics faction soft coup against the Green Party Leadership was established after the posting of the provisional candidate list, the Green Leadership pushed their disloyal into an airlock too…
Left-wing Green Party members lose leader Nicole Geluk-Le Gros
A left-wing group within the Green Party often seen as being at odds with the current leadership has had a leadership change of its own.
The Green Left Network (GLN), a group of Green members that “works to promote an explicitly anti-capitalist” vision for the Green Party, according to its website, has lost one of its co-convenors, Nicole Geluk-Le Gros, following the Network’s online AGM last week.
Geluk-Le Gros was ejected from her co-convenor position on the GLN’s executive under a process known as Re-open Nominations or “RON”.
This occurs when a person is trying to reapply for their position and at least a quarter of voting members vote to “reopen nominations” to other members, rather than endorse that person’s reappointment. It is the same process by which party co-leader James Shaw lost the party co-leadership last year, before regaining it.
there could be a wider issue at play, which is a shift within the party away from networks like the GLN towards what are known as “lived experience networks”.
These are groups organised around people’s lived experience as part of the rainbow or disabled communities, for example.
A recent constitutional change in the party gave lived experience groups more power within the Green Party’s organisational structure – power that is not given to networks that organise along more ideological lines.
…this final stab at the Greens and claims of cultural insensitivity is the last gasp of this clique.
Their attempts at smearing the Greens is more revenge tactic than legitimate grievance and Chloe has clearly signalled she won’t allow this clique to have any more say over how the Greens will move forward under her leadership.
Again, the Greens using the Waka jumping legislation to remove Tana is not an abuse of power.
The Greens principled position on this has always been that an MP making a stand on a matter of principle should never have the legislation used against them, but that’s not what is happening here.
Darleen is linked by her Husband to allegations of migrant worker exploitation and after a serious investigation found that there were many issues that could not be over looked and as such for the good of the Party she had to stand down.
She has refused that, quit the Party and now argues she deserves to stay in Parliament despite being a Party List MP.
Chloe is right to demand she stand down and Chloe has stood by a process that has had natural justice at its heart.
The Party must move on to the actual issues of the day, the terrible climate catastrophe that is occurring right now and the desperate level of economic injustice that allows the donor class to write their own laws to advance their interests at the cost of the common good!
The Green leadership must not back down, remove Tana using the Waka Jumping legislation, get back to the real issues and quietly have a long hard look at candidate selection.
Um. Wasn’t Miss le Gross the one who was advocating for the Greens to actually have some left-wing policies, to not just act as blind support for the extreme neoliberals of Labour as they did in 2017 and 2020?
Chloe needs to be the sole leader of the greens and take control of the few rabble or kick them out .They need to get back to real policy and the rank and file need to stop pushing their own meaningless agenda because little Jonny or Jane has not got headlines .
All the key points nailed Martyn.
One of the three leavers is married to Dr Kerekere apparently, and the language of their statement which media channels lapped up like a dog revisiting a regurgitated dinner, seemed revenge seeking for the “Cry Baby” affair.
People of all stripes loved Efeso, so how the hell his untimely passing was somehow used to diss Pasifika Greens is baffling. Green voters should be grateful the effective leader, given Marama is on sick leave, is holding the line on this.
If you take the time to read Green policy it is actually pretty good in class terms–factions can undermine any political party or grouping, conducting inner party struggle is as important as the public activity. Real world politics is class politics despite the Parliamentary parties stating they represent “all New Zealanders” which they patently do not. Greens and TPM are closest to being class left that we have in the NZ Parliament at the moment. So expelling duds like Tana is worth it.
Thanks Tiger Mountain for that key piece of information, that one of the leavers is married to Dr Kerekere. It’s an important contextual detail that the media seem to have left out in their lust for more sensationalism.
Inevitably someone may want proof, so here is a link…
https://waateanews.com/2024/07/29/pasifika-walkout-at-greens-agm/
Dr Kerekere’s wife is Alofa Aiono. Was mentioned on a TV news channel too.
Bring the Greener Greens forward.
Back to Basics.
Pacific members need to remember they are mainly there to advocate for their home islands environmentally speaking. Their wider families and friends will be among the first to be displaced by climate catastrophe.
Then they advocate for fair treatment for Pacific people here in NZ. Social Justice.
The Greens cannot flourish by trying to please so many people. Yes, we know there is a lot to do and you feel you need to take up the cudgels on their behave. However, with all the recent disappointments in the party, get back to basics. Make it clear to the country that your main aims are green aims.
The likes of Genter may get on some peoples’ nerves but at least she walks the walk, or rather rides. She appears to put her money where her mouth is and the rest of you need to show that too. You need more Nandors and Sues and fewer Kerekeres, Tanas, and other box tickers.
Martyn is correct about Tana’s motive. She is not sitting there staunchly defending a matter of principle. She’s just reluctant to get off the gravy train. Big difference. She’s not needed. There are unfortunately plenty to take her place, when what you really need is a genuine tree-hugging Greenie.
Joy Genter publicly reprimanded an obnoxious white cisgender male, and if that’s not in keeping with the Green ethos, then I don’t know what is. ( He had it coming anyway.)
She humiliated him nicely. Okay so she broke parliamentary protocol doing so.
I’d be no good in parliament. The temptation to bang heads together would be too great.
Joy The occupational hazards are worse: serial adultery, lesbian bed-hopping, pix in pj’s. Thank God Genter’s a physical cyclist, or a head banging might have occurred. What is the sound of an empty head banging ? Yikes.
Why attempt to convince your opponent of an opposing view when you can humiliate them?
This sort of disgusting woke bullying only wins the left enemies.
It’s dumb and childish.
She’d already tried the ‘convincing’ approach but as we know, many people cannot be convinced despite the evidence. You wonder why, perhaps they are extremely stubborn and refuse to admit their error. Or they have to stick to the party line even when it’s stupid.
That does sounds dumb and childish.
Joy They mightn’t be stubborn, or having to stick to the party line, they might just be stupid. Smart people can dumb down when necessary, but stupid people can’t smarten up, and that’s a fact seen in Parliament ad infinitum. Sigh.
The best irrationality was the lass, Green I think, saying that there was no point imprisoning crims when they’ve already done and committed an offence. So what are police meant to do then? Arrest and imprison persons of interest before they commit a crime to stop them doing it ? Odd.
JAG has been found in contempt of the house. Ok, that’s how it is. But she sure had the moral high ground and her target is a disgrace to the country he pretends to serve.
hahaha this is hilarious.
Both sides trying to out victim each other.
The green party losing James Shaw was the worst thing for our climate.
In a democracy the people decide who their representatives will be. In a democracy it is the people who appoint and dismiss their representatives. Not a hereditary monarch, not some party hierarch and not some political clique. The people themselves.
That is not going to happen in this case because New Zealand is not a democracy.
It is a nonsense to say that the party may decide in matters relating to personal morality but not in relation to political principle. The personal and political are hard to distinguish, and political elites are adept at further smudging over what distinction there is.
There is no good way out for the Green Party, because the Green Party, like every other parliamentary party, cherish their power over the people.
Soooooo.
You aren’t as pure woke as me so you’re the cause of all wrong in the world seems to be a far more pervasive idea in the Greens than you might expect.
Sad.
What I don’t like is the feral attack on their list MP. Over the weekend the green leader said ‘it’s obvious she (Darleen) is unfit for parliament and has to go. There have been no criminal charges for her or her husband all there has been is a long delayed and very expensive investigation by the Green Party with no solid evidence of any wrong doing by the MP. As you said in this post ‘Darleen is linked by her Husband to allegations’. Linked to allegations that’s all. So how is she unfit for parliament. This is bullying and media manipulation gone mad and the cynical, nasty attack on a person that no doubt a few months back was considered a rising star of the party is sad to see and one that without evidence cannot be supported.
For the Greens happy to compromise on principles to contemplate using the Waka hopping bill reminds me of the Groucho Marx quip of ‘these are my principles and if you don’t like them I have others’.
Well, Tana would’ve been a rising star if she hadn’t ripped of vulnerable migrant workers, however she lied about that so guess what, not a rising star after all.
The problem with the Greens is their goal seems to be to keep every one happy which is just not feasible.
National are make decisions that many on this platform do not like but at least people know things are happening and these moves will be judged at the next election.
The Greens are losing the battle for the hearts and mind of the voters if they appear week in this case.
People don’t like this government because they are so clearly sell outs to donors and accommodating open corruption from the likes of Jones to stay in power. In addition how the hell could you believe a word that comes out of Luxon’s mouth Trevor. You know they under budgeted health, you know they are borrowing to fund tax breaks while letting infrastructure go further south. They are even worse than the last government. That’s beyond question now and we haven’t even had a year of these wankers.
Trevor. The Greens goal seems to be to keep everyone happy ? I beg to differ. I doubt they want to keep heterosexual white males happy, in fact I seem to recall Marama suggesting that they delete themselves. I doubt they want women other than themselves to have voices, in fact I seem to recall them demonstrating against this at Albert Park in Auckland not so very long ago. Their own imported members are quitting because they feel culturally unsafe, and some of those imports might be happier returning to their own cultures if accommodating differences is beyond them.
Yeah totally agree and using Efeso in that ridiculous letter to the media was in very bad taste indeed. Appalling. And stupid. Especially when one of the members who put their name to that shameless document clearly had an axe to grind on behalf of Elizabeth. Hold steady Chloe and obviously the old adage of never say never has come home to roost here because the Greens must use the Waka jumping law to get rid of another corrupt gravy train poli. If it wasn’t the beginning of this term, then perhaps a discrete vail would have been drawn over the matter, but three years is too long for this kind of grift. Tana has to go.
Her goal is to get more votes than Labour. So she has to remove all the members who disagree with her first.
Here is something to get Green teeth into.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/523700/lost-report-sheds-light-on-contamination-at-controversial-new-plymouth-chemical-plant
The extent of soil contamination at a controversial New Plymouth chemical plant has been revealed after a report ‘lost’ since the late 1990s emerged.
Taranaki Regional Council (TRC) has released the Soil and Groundwater Evaluation, after first seeking permission from multinational chemicals giant Dow.
It is part of a wider 1996 Environmental Assessment Project (EAP) at Dow’s former manufacturing facility at Paritūtū.
It shows soil contamination was in places more than 450 times that of previously acknowledged groundwater contamination.
It was also more than 1400 times higher than a level the TRC said was acceptable – based on an overseas benchmark – during its 1996 investigation of the Ivon Watkins plant at Buller Street in New Plymouth.
Dioxins researcher Andrew Gibbs said new information in the rediscovered report added weight to an argument that a current investigation of the Paritūtū site should be extended into neighbouring Centennial Park.
The Paritūtū plant was demolished in 2022, and Dow and its New Zealand-based remediation partner Tonkin & Taylor are part way through a clean-up process expected to take several years.
Tonkin & Taylor has finished a Preliminary Site Investigation (PSI) which has been submitted to the TRC and is being independently reviewed by consultants Beca Group.
Ivon Watkins – later Ivon Watkins-Dow – made the herbicides 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D at Paritūtū from 1960 through to 1987.
The herbicides, which contained toxic dioxins, were a key component of Agent Orange – the defoliant used by the US military in the Vietnam War – which has been linked to cancers and birth defects.
It was expected given the average 46-day half-life of the chemicals – the time for 50 percent of it to breakdown cited in the 1996 EAP – any contamination discovered in the PSI would be at a reduced level.
Lost report found
A summary of the ‘lost’ Soil and Groundwater Evaluation was leaked to Gibbs, but it did not include soil testing data.
Gibbs and RNZ asked to see the full report, but were initially told it could not be found.
TRC director of environment quality Abby Matthews said the report – which was stamped “confidential” – was never “missing as such” as it had always been in its archives, but not where it was expected to be.
“It appears the report had been re-filed in the wrong box, possibly when our archiving system changed in the late 1990s.
More quality on the List? That’s a question for the Green membership. They really need to take a good look at what their values are, what they stand for, and their current relevance. Weed out the dodgy, self serving List aspirants. Or perhaps they deserve all the flotsam.
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