A group of local people using Suffrage Day to protest the undermining of democracy in Christchurch will gather at the Bridge of Remembrance on Wednesday, September 19 at 5.30pm wearing green, white and purple.
Speakers have been organised and a petition will be launched. Read the comments for more details.
While they are celebrating nearly 120 years of women voting, they will be protesting, in particular, the Government decision to postpone the elections of Ecan representatives until at least 2016, the sweeping aside of city council decision making in the rebuild and the recent announcement of school closures and mergers.
A commissioner was brought in a couple of years ago to sort out the apparently dysfunctional regional council Ecan, which couldn’t come up with a water plan. One election was cancelled -who needs elections when one person can do it all ;-^) – but it was expected that there would be public participation in the democratic process (known as voting) for the regional council in 2013.
An organiser, Katherine Peet from Network Waitangi Otautahi, also wants the gathering to tell the Government to respect and trust democracy in the Christchurn rebuild.”SAY Yes to local democracy and NO to the suspension of ECAN elections and sweeping aside of elected city council decision making. Let’s add a dose of democracy to the Christchurch rebuild. Make a stand to bring back local democracy – it’s what Kate Sheppard would have done. Don’t let Canterbury women be the first to lose our local and regional vote.”
On September 19, 1893, New Zealand was the first country to give women the vote and it started in Christchurch with Kate Sheppard and others. Their work is commemorated on a sculpture near the Worcester Street bridge, which is still in the red zone.
Partly based on supplied material
