Redrawn and newly named seat could save NT Speaker
NEARLY twice the size of the state of Victoria, the redrawn and newly named seat of Gwoja is likely to be the electorate that saves NT Speaker Chansey Paech from being kicked into the political wilderness
Northern Territory
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NEARLY twice the size of the state of Victoria, the redrawn and newly named seat of Gwoja is likely to be the electorate that saves NT Speaker Chansey Paech from being kicked into the political wilderness.
Formerly the electorate of Stuart, the recent electoral redistribution means the seat now stretches from the South Australian border to the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf, making it more than six times larger than Tasmania.
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Renamed Gwoja, the electorate is a safe Labor seat, with a notional margin of 22.2 per cent.
MLA Chansey Paech, whose margin of 8.5 per cent in Namatjira was wiped out by the redistribution, will contest Gwoja for Labor, telling the NT News late last year that he would be the “best fit” for the Aboriginal-community dominant seat.
With Namatjira now notionally a CLP seat, Mr Paech ran the significant risk of losing at the upcoming election if he hadn’t made the switch.
MLAs moving seats with the current of redistributions and then winning is not unusual, Queensland University of Technology politics professor and former Queensland parliamentary speaker Professor John Mickel said.
Opposition Leader Lia Finocchiaro did this at the 2016 election, moving from Drysdale to the more CLP-friendly neighbouring seat of Spillett.
There have been bolder moves historically, particularly by former Federal Labor leader Dr H. V. Evatt, who in facing certain wipe-out in his marginal inner-city Sydney seat in 1958 opted to move some 170km away to the electorate of Hunter.
Three years before becoming Queensland’s 34th Premier, Wayne Goss moved from his marginal Brisbane seat to the friendlier-to-Labor electorate of Logan.
Prof Mickel said politicians had to be careful explaining such a move, particularly now as cynicism among voters increases.
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He said at general elections, where the seat is new and has a new name, it’s much easier to do as voters may have vague knowledge of what’s going on. In a by-election, an electorate switch would be “nigh impossible”.
Mr Paech’s competitors so far are CLP’s Phillip Alice and Australian Federation Party’s Kenny Lechleitner.
On its old boundaries, Gwoja nee Stuart was held by the CLP for 13 out of 45 years. All other times it has been held by Labor until Mr McConnell left the party in 2019.
CANDIDATES
NAME: Chansey Paech
PARTY: NT Labor
WHY PEOPLE SHOULD VOTE FOR YOU: I’m very proud the Territory Labor Government has made progress on creating a more equitable Northern Territory.
This is the work I want to continue as Member for Gwoja. What we are achieving in areas like housing, our commitment to build new homes and extend others, is making a big difference to many families.
And with the smaller things – getting better sports infrastructure, playgrounds on communities, community laundries – it all matters.
I want to continue to make a difference in Gwoja, to ensure more equitable services, for jobs, for autonomy over lives and communities, for hope in the future of bush communities.
NAME: Kenny Lechleitner
PARTY: Australian Federation Party
WHY PEOPLE SHOULD VOTE FOR YOU: Kenny Japangardi Lechleitner will bring many years’ experience working with communities desperately in need of a strong voice that will help shape a collective future. Gwoja now has real choice to bring change in Social and Economic inclusion for all participants and drive regional economic opportunity for the bush.
Kenny will advocate for an inclusive law and order policy with shared cultural principle of civics.
“The Communities of Gwoja need an educational pathway to higher learning for our young people and real rehabilitation for our people in correctional services.”
Kenny Japangardi Lechleitner is the man to deliver for the bush.
NAME: Phillip Alice
PARTY: CLP
WHY PEOPLE SHOULD VOTE FOR YOU: I am an Arrente Traditional Leader and have lived my whole life along with my wife Agnes and my two children and grandchildren in the Santa Teresa community south of Alice Springs. I am standing for the Country Liberal Party of the Northern Territory in the seat of Gwoja at the 2020 Northern Territory election on Saturday, August 22 because I am the strongest person to get things done for the community.
For 25 years I have worked as a Community Policeman in the Santa Teresa community. For 10 years, I was the only Community Police Officer based in Santa Teresa looking after 600 of our people and as well as 200 people at the Titjikala community. I love my sport.
I am a Traditional Aboriginal man and the spokesman of the Santa Teresa Leadership Group.
HISTORY
Making its debut in 2020 after being redrawn and renamed, the electorate of Gwoja is named after Walpiri-Anmatyerre elder and Coniston massacre survivor Gwoya Tjungurrayi.
Immortalised on the Australian $2 coin, Tjungurrayi also went by the nickname of One Pound Jimmy and was an elder, boomerang salesman and the first Aboriginal to be featured on a postage stamp.
He survived the Coniston Massacre, a brutal outback mass killing in 1928, where up to 60 people lost their lives.
MLA Scott McConnell championed the renaming of the seat from Stuart to Gwoja.
The electorate is roughly 427,605sq km in size, making it nearly twice as large as the state of Victoria and more than six times the size of Tasmania.
It is roughly the same size as Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands combined.
2016 RESULT (STUART)
Two-party preferred
NT Labor: 75.4 per cent
CLP: 24.6 per cent
PREVIOUS MEMBERS
Roger Vale, CLP, 1974-83
Brian Ede, Labor, 1983-96
Peter Toyne, Labor, 96-’06
Karl Hampton, Labor, ‘06-2012
Bess Price, CLP, 2012-2016
Scott McConnell, Labor/ Independent, 2016-2020
Originally published as Redrawn and newly named seat could save NT Speaker