Mayor & City Councillors. How Come People Of Christchurch Have To Learn From Aussie Media Who Is Involved Behind Closed Doors Re Selling Enable – KOA

Mayor & City Councillors,

So, is this recent report in The Australian correct? Has Macquarie Capital “been tapped for a possible $NZ1bn fibre asset sale”?

Please confirm or deny ASAP.

And how come the people of Christchurch, who own Enable, have to find out via Australian media what is going on behind closed doors regarding a prospective sale of Enable? Macquarie has not been identified in any NZ media report.

Today’s Press reports that the City Council’s holding company, CCHL, is working behind closed doors on the proposed expansion of Lyttelton Port.

Is Enable being touted for sale to pay for that port expansion?

Has Macquarie Capital been “tapped” for the Lyttelton project as well? If not, who has been?

The people of Christchurch – the owners of both Enable and Lyttelton Port – are owed a please explain from the Christchurch City Council which operates both these highly valuable assets on our behalf.

Very recently CCC had to back off from the proposal to sell one of your car park buildings, because of overwhelming public opposition. Some of you declared that building not a core Council asset.

Well, both Enable and Lyttelton Port are very much core Council assets. You have no mandate to conduct back room deals to sell Enable, under the guise of financing the port expansion. None of you campaigned on this at the 2025 election and a number of you signed Keep Our Assets’ pledge not to sell assets. We intend to keep you to that.

Even more egregiously, who is likely to buy a billion dollar lucrative asset? A good guess would be that it will be a transnational corporation, meaning that this core asset (and its income – and dividends to CCC) would leave Christchurch public ownership and join the long list of NZ businesses now enriching overseas owners.

We call on you, individually and collectively, to declare that Enable is not for sale.

Best wishes,

Murray

Murray Horton
Convenor
 
Keep Our Assets-Canterbury