Home

New Zealanders surprised by Ardern’s historic election win

Jacinda Ardern
Reading Time: < 1 minute

One day after their country’s general election, New Zealanders on Sunday said they were surprised by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s thumping historic win.

Ardern on Saturday (October 17) delivered the biggest election victory for her centre-left Labour Party in half a century.

Her new majority in parliament will allow her to form the first single-party government since New Zealand adopted a proportional voting system in 1996.

Labour won 64 of the 120 seats in the country’s unicameral parliament.

The resounding victory is a yes vote for Ardern’s progressive, democratic governance and for her leadership in crushing COVID-19 in the country, as well as her handling of a massacre of 51 worshippers at two Christchurch mosques and a fatal volcano eruption.

Ardern said on Sunday, she would form a government within three weeks but declined to say whether she would rule alone or form a coalition.

Author

MOST READ