Bay of Plenty Times
  • Bay of Plenty Times home
  • Latest news
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
  • Sport
  • Video
  • Death notices
  • Classifieds

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • On The Up
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Residential property listings
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
  • Sport

Locations

  • Coromandel & Hauraki
  • Katikati
  • Tauranga
  • Mount Maunganui
  • Pāpāmoa
  • Te Puke
  • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua

Media

  • Video
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-Editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

Weather

  • Thames
  • Tauranga
  • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • What the Actual
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Bay of Plenty Times

Tommy Wilson: What colours will make up our new political flag?

Bay of Plenty Times
18 Sep, 2017 12:13 AM5 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Who will Winston end up in bed with this time? Photo/file

Who will Winston end up in bed with this time? Photo/file

Red and white, blue and white, red and green, blue and brown with a splash of Act yellow - or red, green and Maori Party brown.

What colours will our new political flag be flying come next Monday? My money is on the last trifecta of red, green and brown, and the korero on the kumara vine out there in the Waiariki is saying the same thing.

One thing is for sure, one, possibly two of these colours will come down off the political flag post, blown out and sent home like the torch on the television series Survivor.

Yet another could be flying at half-mast and farewelled forever.

Never in my time has an election held so much crouch 'n hold intrigue and kept the country engaged.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Not even the two boys with the bad haircuts playing war games have been able to bump the Bill of Rights and Jacinderella off the front page, and nor has tornadoes in Texas or flooding in Florida.

It just goes on and on with more twists than a Chubby Checker record.

While the poles have been going up and down like a Gold Coast roller coaster, the country has been swinging from red to blue and back again and somewhere in the middle have been the minor parties, looking for life rafts to get them back on board the mothership.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Will he go? Will she stay, and whom will Winston end up in bed with?

Then there is the real possibility of the final curtain coming down on the comeback king, leaving him standing outside the coalition honeymoon bedroom altogether.

For my two bobs' worth of political bed partners, my money is on the moenga (bed) being shared as it has been for the last three elections - with the Maori Party.

The reality is all the possible coalition parties are dancing around Winston like an excuse me waltz, hoping they will not have to pick him as a partner. It could be a last supper waltz on Saturday night or a dance of the desperate come Sunday morning.

So, hold on to your political potae (hat) because the last episode of Survivor is going to be a doozy.

Then, when it is all over, bar the post-match boohoo and blame game, we can all get back to the other life we had before Labour found the missing glass slipper belonging to their golden girl Jacinderella.

What then? What will life after the elections look like?

Spring-cleaning, school holidays, a book launch and breaking out the boogie boards ready for summer are all on my hit list.

Successful politicians can crouch and hold back home with their families, who have become foreign to them over the last few weeks, and the new kids on the backbench block can book a ticket to three years of bumpy plane rides to Wellington.

There is a change coming. and if that change brings more wahine and more Maori in Parliament, then bring it on.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

How lucky we are to be born in a country where the freedom to voice our political opinions and vote for someone to represent these opinions is a cornerstone of democracy - and we should never take this for granted.

In my experience of living in most corners of the world, we have a country to call home like no other.

We get to wake up in a world where half of the people living in it go to bed hungry, and about a quarter of the world is at war.

The common cause for all of the above is greed and, if there is one thing we can all agree on, we have enough for everyone here in Aotearoa New Zealand, if we share it more evenly.

Wherever this election takes us, I hope it takes the homeless to a place they can call home and the environment to where our country truly is clean and green.

All of us get two opportunities to do this when we vote for a party and a person. Each of these opportunities can add a feather to the korowai (cloak) of comfort for those who do not have what most of us wake up to each day. Kai, a whare and most importantly, hope.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

All of us should ask ourselves what we want from the vote we cast. Is it something for ourselves or for those who do not have what we have?

This is what our kids are starting to understand about politics and, for me, the biggest positive from this boxed set of Survivor elections is politics has been normalised on the front page, and our kids are engaging.

For those of you who stood up and had a go - bravo to you all. Enjoy having your whanau and family back next Monday. To my own family standing in Whakatane and here in Tauranga Moana, Go hard Kiritapu and Billy Boy.

Kia aroha ki te tangata. Respect for all.

Tommy Kapai is a best-selling author and local writer.
■ tommykapai@gmail.com

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Bay of Plenty Times

Bay of Plenty Times

Four-vehicle crash closes SH29, detours via Rotorua or Waihī

08 May 08:53 PM
Bay of Plenty Times

How a Tauranga festival is championing disability sports and inclusion

08 May 08:45 PM
Bay of Plenty Times

Inside a council's new offices – and why it's paying $91.9m to lease, not own

08 May 06:18 PM

One tiny baby’s fight to survive

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Bay of Plenty Times

Four-vehicle crash closes SH29, detours via Rotorua or Waihī

Four-vehicle crash closes SH29, detours via Rotorua or Waihī

08 May 08:53 PM

Six people have been injured, one seriously.

How a Tauranga festival is championing disability sports and inclusion

How a Tauranga festival is championing disability sports and inclusion

08 May 08:45 PM
Inside a council's new offices – and why it's paying $91.9m to lease, not own

Inside a council's new offices – and why it's paying $91.9m to lease, not own

08 May 06:18 PM
German tourist stabbed by drunk man who couldn't find his car keys

German tourist stabbed by drunk man who couldn't find his car keys

08 May 08:00 AM
Connected workers are safer workers 
sponsored

Connected workers are safer workers 

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • Bay of Plenty Times e-edition
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Subscribe to the Bay of Plenty Times
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • What the Actual
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven CarGuide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP