New Zealanders are gearing up this week to vote in a series of upcoming, localized practice elections designed to prepare them for voting in next year’s real election.
All around the country, mock ballots are being held in cities and districts large and small, with residents asked to select candidates for a series of fictional political positions called “mayoralties” and “councillorships.”
The candidates locals are asked to select from have been specially designed by the commission to look and sound like real candidates, without having any of the actual qualifications or personality traits required to do their jobs effectively.
Chief Electoral Officer Robert Peden said that while the candidates presented to voters in these practice elections were “quite obviously not real,” they were just meant to be a fun way for citizens to practice their democratic right to vote, so that they’ll have a good sense of how to do it when it comes time for an election with actual ramifications.
“This is really just a chance for you to get a sense for things, and gain an understanding of how your vote might tangibly affect outcomes in your community,” he explained. “Obviously, in a real election, nobody would vote for someone like [Wellington mayoral candidate] John Morrison, but because this is just for fun, maybe you’d like to experiment and see what happens. It’s all a learning experience, really.”
Peden said there were no wrong answers, and citizens could vote for whoever they liked, though some cities and regions would be “monitored” if it appeared they were doing particularly bad in their practice runs.
In Auckland, the commission will be watching to ensure that excessive numbers of people aren’t voting for human megaphone John Minto, while in Invercargill, the majority of the population has been monitored for over a decade after repeatedly failing the test to not elect Tim Shadbolt.
