By Kishor Napier-Raman and Stephen Brook
As the results trickled in on Saturday night, Liverpool mayor Ned Mannoun was celebrating a “miracle”.
Despite months of damaging headlines about the council – an interim report from the Office of Local Government outlining widespread dysfunction and nepotism, which is now being challenged; attempts by Local Government Minister Ron Hoenig to get the council suspended; and the fallout from the sacking of chief executive John Ajaka, which enraged both the unions and Ray Hadley – Mannoun, a Liberal who’s been mayor in deep Labor territory for 10 years, looks set for another term.
But an altercation out on the hustings last week between the mayor and a rival candidate escalated into a debate over the big questions facing Liverpool’s ratepayers – whether Ned Mannoun smells, in the literal sense. And where he got his suit.
This is the garbage bin of democracy after all, where the stakes are low and the intensity of the blood feuds high. Mannoun’s antagonist was a charming chap named Peter Ristevski, who ran unsuccessfully for mayor under the wholly unoriginal slogan “Make Liverpool Great Again”.
The pair have history, which we believe dates back to a 2015 preselection fight. More recently, Mannoun is suing Ristevski, a former fellow Liberal councillor, for defamation over a Facebook comment that alleged he was a “crim”, with a hearing set for the District Court this month.
And last year, Ristevski was convicted and fined for breaching electoral laws over a racist pamphlet attacking Mannoun’s wife, the now-Holsworthy Liberal MP Tina Ayyad, during the state election.
Last week, Ristevski launched into a bizarre tirade, which Mannoun proceeded to film, saying he wanted to stop his rival defaming him.
“I will be telling everyone the truth, you slippery slimeball,” Ristevski said, before launching into his unsubstantiated tirade.
“You are a slimeball, I swear to god you are … a piece of shit … you stink,” he continued, repeatedly asking Mannoun whether he was wearing deodorant.
Ristevski then accused Mannoun of wearing an Armani suit.
“No, it’s a suit from Liverpool mate. I bought it from Vespa Fashion,” Mannoun said.
Not an Armani suit … Liverpool Mayor Ned Mannoun.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos
“What’s that disease on your face?” Ristevski continued.
Mannoun told CBD he’d filed a police report over the altercation. Ristevski, meanwhile, refused to back down when contacted by CBD on Monday, telling us Mannoun had instigated things by standing in his personal space.
“He did stink because he’s been wearing this Armani suit for a week. I was getting light-headed myself from the smell,” Ristevski said.
Local government remains undefeated.
GUARDIAN GOERS
Your CBD correspondent remembers once attending a Guardian Australia staff function and revealing he was a former employee of its British version.
“Why would you ever leave?” a progressive bright young thing* asked with wide-eyed, slightly patronising innocence, as if the website was some sort of journalistic Hotel California.
Which in a roundabout way brings us to the Guardian Australia’s high-profile political reporter Amy Remeikis, the latest staff member to check out from the media organisation you can never leave. Unless you’re sick of the meagre wages.
Remeikis has been on ABC’s Insiders and Ten’s The Project with some pretty forthright progressive commentary, making her a target of The Australian’s Media Diary, who reckon she’s irresistible clickbait for the base. We counted 13 mentions in the paper in the past two years, the most recent landing on Monday.
Remeikis has handed in her notice to The Guardian and is soon to take up a gig at progressive think tank The Australia Institute. We’ll see whether she remains an object of journalistic fascination for The Australian’s media team, who appeared to be unaware of her new job status.
The normally loquacious Remeikis declined to comment and directed us to the Guardian’s PR unit, who failed to get back to us before deadline.
*And that progressive bright young thing at the Guardian staff party? He now works at the ABC.
DISAPPEARING ACT
Well-regarded media lawyer Stuart Gibson tells clients via his bio on the website of firm Macpherson Kelley that he is “recognised as one of Australia’s top media and defamation lawyers and has been involved in many landmark judgments”.
So, what’s the latest?
Gibson had been representing a long-standing client, Jonathon Welch AM, who rose to fame as the choirmaster of a singing group for people who had fallen on hard times, featured on the ABC documentary The Choir of Hard Knocks.
Then suddenly, he wasn’t, prompting the rescheduling of a Federal Court mediation until later this month.
Welch is taking action in the Federal Court alleging the breach of a deed of settlement and rebranding undertakings, but a mediation hearing scheduled for last week has been delayed until the end of the month.
We phoned Macpherson Kelley and were first told Gibson was on leave, and then were told someone would get back to us. But they didn’t.
We reached out to Gibson and Welch but didn’t hear back.
And when we formally asked the firm’s media unit for more details, we were told: “In response to your enquiry, as this is an ongoing matter Macpherson Kelley feel it is not appropriate to make any comment.”
When we know, you will.
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