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Magazine Contributors Frans Hertoghs Kiwikorrels: Fence 'n hope
Magazine Contributors Frans Hertoghs Kiwikorrels: Fence 'n hope
| Kiwikorrels: Fence 'n hope |
 Every country is a company worth billions. It buys and sells, it saves and spends and it looks (or not) after its employees. It has a reputation and is well known. It has neighbours and allies, beggars and competitors. It has money and debts. Each country has to look after itself and preferably grow each year.By Frans Hertoghs New Zealand is a small country but nevertheless all four million kiwis together earned more than one hundred billion US dollars last year. You would expect that a country like this will be governed by a group of experts who manage that united property as efficiently as possible. But nothing is further from the truth.School class The New Zealand parliament resembles a high school class with a ‘toffe-jongens’ mentality. In the back-row are the 'sukkels', people you never hear or see. They read a paper or write a letter. One or two take a nap. On the front bench are the tormentors and ringleaders. They occupy themselves almost exclusively to outsmart the opposition. The remarks and insults fly back and forth. Whistling, booing and screaming are quite common. A speaker resides high above this disorganised tossing and turning. She has to keep the class in line without authority or sanctions. Regularly she shouts over the hooligans and hammers her wooden hammer on her dented desk. Sometimes she sends one away. "Would the honoured member mind leaving this room!" The only thing that is missing is: "And you will immediately rinse your mouth with soap!" The punished parliamentarian firstly pretends that he doesn't hear her and leaves provocatively slow and squizzes in a joke with a fellow member on his way to the door. He does not have to go to the director and therefore is free to do what he wants. Scoring In good Anglo-Saxon tradition only two parties reign, the lefty Labour and the right-wing Nationals. And additionally a couple of smaller parties such as The Greens, The Maori Party and New Zealand First (!). But they have to share about five of the hundred and twenty seats. Still they frequently do good business by making the most of the shaky balance of the big boys. But in the end they don't gain much. Because that is the aim of the entire child's game: votes. Not the country's interest, but the party's own importance is the real purpose of this show of the members of Parliament. Score at the cost of the opposition. It is as if you watch an endless game of rugby. The players want to score and tackle the opposition whichever way. And by doing this the ranks of their own party stay painstakingly closed. Team members stand by each other and protect each other. Tennis ball That sometimes leads to entertaining scenes. David Benson Pope was one of the new ministers in the last Labour government of Helen Clark. But soon he was in a terrible mess. It started with the opposition accusing him of child abuse. It is assumed that twenty-eight years ago, as a teacher at a high school, he taped a boy's hands to a school desk and stuffed a hard-as-a-rock tennis ball in his mouth. Unfortunately BP could not remember this at all. The matter was examined, an appeal was allowed, but so far BP has not been prosecuted. His minister's seat changed a bit, but he stayed put. Recently it turned out that he had a hand in the dismissal of a staff member of his department who turned out to be the girlfriend of the press secretary of National. BP was questioned about this. Both to the parliament as well as to Clark he maintained not to know anything. It appeared that he had lied to both of them and Helen Clark removed him from his minister seat. But she only did that days after the media found out. The moral: one is allowed to lie to and against one's own party as long as one doesn't get caught. Fence 'n hope Each country is a company worth billions. New Zealand too. Absolutely no company could permit itself to bicker about businesses like this in front of the greedy camera for weeks on end. The towering dollar strangles the export and stimulates over-consumption. Savings have never been that low and the interest rate is by far the highest of all the developed countries. The government spends money as if there is no tomorrow. The entire economy stagnates and staggers. But the parliamentarians have better things on their hand then to pay attention to this. In front of the eye of the national camera they tumble over each other on the floor, scolding and fighting. The country drifts around aimlessly. The case Benson Pope is a strong example of how this country is governed. And meanwhile its new nickname seems to be taken over by all parties : Fence `n Hope. The Dutch version of this article is published in the September/October 2007 edition of Holland Focus. Ask your News Agent or take out a subscription.
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