Matt Johnston: Mikakos, Andrews’ bitter break-up finally made public
It was only a matter of time before someone had to give. And yet for months, despite being sidelined, Jenny Mikakos never once betrayed her Dear Leader. But for anyone in the know, the cracks in her relationship with Daniel Andrews were showing a long time ago.
Opinion
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At the beginning of last year, Jenny Mikakos celebrated her 50th birthday.
It had been a big couple of months for the first Greek woman to be elected to state parliament.
She was flying high after being sworn in as Health Minister when Labor smashed its opposition at the state election.
As the year progressed, she shouldered all the work given to her by Premier Daniel Andrews, who as a former health minister takes a special interest in the portfolio.
Mikakos is tireless, and prides herself on this relentless work ethic. Some of those who saw the minister in action started to question, however, whether all the wheel-spinning was effective in the biggest portfolio in government.
Andrews, who seems to back his ministers until he really doesn’t, was initially steadfast in his praise for his loyal cabinet colleague.
But many saw that during the pandemic, something changed in their relationship.
Whether the Premier lost faith in her capacity as a minister, as a public performer, or something else altogether, is hard to tell.
But Mikakos suddenly went missing for long stretches, pushed to the side instead of waiting side of stage for her Premier to finish his daily press performance.
One minister loyal to the Premier recently put it this way: “Well, they hate each other.”
Even so, Mikakos never betrayed her Dear Leader, and kept shouldering her daily workload.
Even as Andrews visibly sidelined her, or mouthed the answers he thought she should have given during press conferences when she was in front of the microphone, she kept going.
In the end, her position was made untenable by the Premier’s evidence to the inquiry into hotel quarantine.
With no love lost towards the end of her political life, Mikakos told Victorians on the way out the door she wasn’t happy with how she had been treated.
Andrews cares little. In fact, as he said, he’d hardly spoken to her in the past week.
When her resignation came, it was relayed to him indirectly and Mikakos sent him a text message signing off.
It wasn’t a break-up by text, but it was close. That is, if the break-up hadn’t already happened long ago.
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