Focus Live: Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson on the loss of the party’s first female co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons.
A Wellington café has been criticised on social media for a message they put outside their door about the death of former Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons.
"Jeanette Fitzsimons has died. Thank you" is the message on a blackboard outside Café Ngaio in Wellington.
A photo of the message wasposted on social media where people expressed their disgust and outrage.
"Last time we were in there the owner gave my 8-year-old daughter a mouthful for asking why they had plastic straws. Horrible place, won't ever go back there," one Twitter user wrote.
"That is a very ugly and hurtful way to mark someone's passing from this Earth," someone else wrote.
Café owner Warren Johnson told Newshub the message was "misinterpreted" and he intended to thank Fitzsimons for her services.
Johnson said he's been getting abuse and threats since the sign went up, even though it has since been rubbed off the blackboard.
"Overnight we've had all the hate speech - 'f**k off and die' sort of thing - in emails," he said.
"People rang me - every time I talked to them, it was as good as gold. They understood where I was coming from. I was trying to say 'thank you' to a person who had done many years of hard work for us."
Former Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons died on Friday, after suffering a "massive stroke" in hospital after a fall on her Coromandel farm on Thursday morning.
Fitzsimons' husband, Harry Parke, said her death was totally unexpected.
"Yesterday morning she was out on the farm doing stuff, she had a bit of a fall and finally ended up in Thames Hospital where she had a massive stroke and died at 9.45pm last night - very peacefully, I might add.
