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COMMENTARY: “Listen, listen,” someone yells, cutting off the raucous cheers of the crowd.
Standing behind the podium at the front of the room, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters smiles.
It is clear that he is in his element.
RICKY WILSON
Winston Peters laughs when an audience member at a public meeting in Ōrewa asks him when he will give all retirees $ 1000 in cash.
The Ōrewa Community Center, north of Auckland, is as crowded as possible given the physical distancing measures required at alert level 2.
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RICKY WILSON
In a speech that feels eerily similar to Don Brash’s “iwi-Kiwi” speech, Winston Peters implores voters not to give too much weight to media reports when deciding who to vote for.
Sitting in chairs about 1 meter apart are more than 100 people, about one in three wearing a mask.
Most of them appear to be members of Peters’ largest fan base: Pākehā over 65.
He is halfway to delivering a searing speech on race relations, attacking Labor’s handling of the Ihumātao protest.
During the 40-minute speech, she regularly reiterated that her party advocates “one law for all”, stating that New Zealand’s first MPs are “gender blind, race and color blind” and that the claims of the Treaty of Waitangi they have become an “industry” that lawyers have benefited from.
“In 2020, too many Maori, with the help of a small minority of the elites of awakened fellow travelers, cannot change their thinking. They are trapped in the past. They wallow in it, ”he says.
RICKY WILSON
After finishing his speech, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters answers questions from the audience about fishing quotas, the Covid-19 party response, and other parties’ moves to increase the retirement age.
This rhetoric has been popular here before.
In 2004, then-National Party leader Don Brash made similar remarks in a controversial speech in Ōrewa, marking a huge leap for National in the polls.
The audience is cheering in response to Peters’ latest comment: “If we want to have a prosperous future together, we must change gears.”
Peters repeats the phrase, louder, for emphasis.
RICKY WILSON
Winston Peters shakes hands with fans, even though the physical distancing requirements are in effect below level 2.
He ends his speech with the words: “Vote first for New Zealand and we will stop any dangerous deal with Ihumātao.
“We ask that you support not only their future, but support all of our futures.”
Ricky Wilson / Stuff
Winston Peters arrives in Ōrewa on his party’s branded bus, adorned with the 2020 election slogan “Back your future”.
Speaking to the media after his speech, Peters is scathing in his response to questions about whether he is “provoking races.”
“If you want to make a statement like that and you don’t care about your country, go ahead,” he says.
RICKY WILSON
Winston Peters speaks briefly with reporters after delivering his speech.
After a reporter asks whether it was true that his party had blocked the Green and Labor movements to ban mining on Conservation lands, Peters abruptly ends the press conference.
“I’ve had enough,” he says, pushing his way through the crowd.
If New Zealand First’s waning popularity in recent polls (which has put the party below the 5% threshold needed to gain representation in Parliament) is anything to go through, this could be Peters’ last hurray, and It seems that he is determined to go. with a bang.
