Forty-six candidates have been confirmed to contest the 15 available seats, including that of Mayor in the upcoming Hamilton City Council elections this year. Nominations closed at midday on 12 August.
The total number of candidates this year is higher than the elections in 2019 (42 candidates) and 2016 (45 candidates). The positions available are six East General Ward, six West General Ward, and two citywide Maaori Ward) and one mayor.
Paula Southgate who won the last mayoral election securing 13,452 votes, is facing a challenge from seven other contenders – Lee Bloor, Lachlan Coleman, Jack Gielen, Horiana Henderson, Riki Manarangi, Donna Pokere-Phillips and Geoff Taylor.
All except Bloor, Coleman and Southgate are also candidates for a ward position. Geoff Taylor is the Deputy Mayor in the current set-up.
In the East Ward, 20 candidates will contest the six seats, the same number as 2019. The candidates are:
Andrew Bydder, Anna Casey-Cox, Mark Donovan, Jack Gielen, Ryan Hamilton, Horiana Henderson, Jess Hona, Amy-Leigh Hopa, Peter Humphreys, Jason Jonassen, Russelle Sonya Knaap, Ross Macleod, Riki Manarangi, Raymond Mudford, Kesh Naidoo-Rauf, Jenny Nand, Jacqui Stokes, Jake Tait, Tania Temoni-Syme and Maxine van Oosten.
This year, in the West Ward, 17 candidates have put their name forward as compared to 19 candidates in 2019. Their names are:
Dave Boyd, Rudi du Plooy, Jose Gonzalez, Louise Hutt, Sanjay Joshi, Dhirendra Kumar Naresh, Angela O’Leary, Emma Pike, Shanti Ralm, Matthew Small, Melissa Smith, Dan Steer, Roger Stratford, Geoff Taylor, Sarah Thomson, Michael West and Ewan Wilson.
There are six pootae (hat) in the waka vying for two new and historic seats in the Kirikiriroa Maaori Ward:
Melaina Huaki, Maatai Ariki Kauae Te Toki, Donna Pokere-Phillips, James Ratana, Moko Tauariki and Te Pora Thompson.
Polling will be held on Saturday, 8 October 2022. Preliminary results would be available on midday, 9th October and final results from 13 – 19 October.
There should be a selection panel even for Local Council because people can’t make intelligent decisions that affect our city if they are totally ignorant of how the City functions. Time to get professional about who governs our City
Decision who governs our city is entirely in hands of people-like you. As a voter you get to decide whether to give another opportunity to those who failed to perform or not. Pose Qs to candidates on their social media platforms, attend public debates to know their stand/views on various issues, etc. For benefit of community, in 2019, NewsViews provided a platform to all mayoral & WRC candidates to put forth their views thr’ our columns Election‘ to enable voters make informed decisions. In fact, today we are publishing a brief profile of all contestants of Hamilton seat of WRC.
Rose, I agree. We need IQ tests conducted for each candidate with results publicised on all election profiles.
Who should then conduct IQ test? Election Commission? Instead, there should be a min. criteria that candidates should meet- Quals., experience with financial/project management, etc to screen out those who are just power hungry and/or have other ulterior, selfish money-making motives. As voters we need to probe more – as NV commented above, be there at open debates, etc
Incorrect – we need an IQ test for voters as it is they who elect ‘wallies’