{"id":4020,"date":"2026-11-08T13:04:07","date_gmt":"2026-11-08T08:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=4020"},"modified":"2026-11-08T13:04:07","modified_gmt":"2026-11-08T08:04:07","slug":"after-close-vote-new-zealand-must-wait-weeks-for-new-govt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=4020","title":{"rendered":"After close vote, New Zealand must wait weeks for new govt"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

New Zealanders faced weeks of uncertainty<\/u><\/a> on Sunday over who \u200cwill govern the country after their general election, with the current coalition holding a slim majority but a potentially decisive slice of votes still to count.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon\u2019s National Party and its partners ACT and New Zealand First were on track for 67 of the currently projected 131-seat parliament, Electoral Commission preliminary results of Saturday\u2019s vote showed. Sixty-six seats are needed \u200bfor a majority.<\/p>\n

But special votes, around 14% of the total, remain to be counted, the commission said.<\/p>\n

These \u2014 including ballots from overseas New Zealanders \u200band people voting outside their electorates \u2014 have historically favoured the left.<\/p>\n

They will be announced with the final count on \u2060November 27.<\/p>\n

Until a coalition to govern New Zealand for the next three years is formed, Luxon will head a caretaker government.<\/p>\n

Centrist party may play key role<\/strong><\/p>\n

Neither the prime minister nor opposition leader Chris Hipkins of the Labour Party claimed victory in their speeches following the election, which has been dominated by talk \u200bof a soft economy and the cost of living.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been saying it\u2019s going to be a very tight election \u2014 it has definitely proven to be that. We unfortunately don\u2019t know what that means for another three weeks,\u201d Luxon told a press conference but added that on current numbers it was \u201cquite feasible\u201d that National could build a government with its current partners.<\/p>\n

If \u200bthe National-led coalition loses its majority at the official count, either it or a left-leaning coalition would require the support of the centrist Opportunity Party,<\/u><\/a> which looks \u200blikely to enter parliament for the first time.<\/p>\n

Luxon, who had repeatedly ruled out working with Opportunity, softened his stance on Sunday, refusing to again rule the party out and instead \u200csaying it \u2060would be entirely appropriate to build a relationship with Opportunity, without defining it.<\/p>\n

Mona Krewel, a senior political science lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington, said she believed it was possible the two parties could work together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually would take them (Opportunity) for very centrist, very pragmatic, and so I do think they could make it work with National,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Low support for National, Labour<\/strong><\/p>\n

New Zealand adopted a mixed-member proportional system in 1996, in which people vote for both a party and a \u200blocal constituency candidate.<\/p>\n

There are 71 constituency, \u200bor electorate, seats, and the Electoral \u2060Commission now projects there will be 60 party list seats.<\/p>\n

National and a minor party, Te Pati Maori, each won a disproportionately high share of constituency seats relative to their popular vote support due to tactical voting, reshaping the balance of \u200bseats in parliament and sparking debate about the electoral system, said political commentator Ben Thomas.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt certainly looks as if \u200bwe\u2019re on track for \u2060the least-proportional parliament that we\u2019ve had, as a result of the vagaries of the rules around how electorate seats interact with the parliament as a whole,\u201d Thomas said.<\/p>\n

The popular vote shares for National and Labour were each below 30%, their lowest since the new system was introduced, signalling voters\u2019 frustration with the slow pace of economic growth \u2060under Luxon \u200band a lack of trust in Hipkins\u2019 promise to turn things around.<\/p>\n

National\u2019s low popular vote means \u200bthe party is set to lose several senior lawmakers in the next parliament, including Finance Minister Nicola Willis. Willis remains in the role for the next four weeks.<\/p>\n

Simeon Brown, a National lawmaker, said \u200bthe party had lost some significant people, making the result \u201cbittersweet\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Zealanders faced weeks of uncertainty on Sunday over who \u200cwill govern the country after their general election, with the current coalition holding a slim majority but a potentially decisive slice of votes still to count. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon\u2019s National Party and its partners ACT and New Zealand First were on track for 67 of the currently projected 131-seat parliament, Electoral Commission preliminary results of Saturday\u2019s vote showed. Sixty-six seats are needed \u200bfor a majority. But special votes, around 14% of the total, remain to be counted, the commission…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4020\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}