The Rise & Rise of Advance New Zealand Party

By Anil Sharma - Advance NZ candidate for Mount Roskill.

Over the past few months, the going has been quite surreal in the virtual world for the National and the Labour Party, the champions of digital media campaigning for New Zealand elections. Each party has been gaining traction using social media to reach far and wide across demographic and socio economically targeted segments to gain political mileage.

But the party which had been the colossal beneficiary making the maximum waves in the use of social media for carrying out the most articulate and impactful political campaigns is the Advance New Zealand Party. By building a massive support base in a short period of time, it has now become a front runner amongst the smaller newer parties. It has been compounded by a series of social media drives starting from its launch at the Logan Campbell Centre in Auckland leading up to the Freedom campaign in Auckland with crowds building up to a few thousands each time an announcement is made by the leaders Billy Te Kahika and Jamie Lee Ross for their supporters to gather.

Somehow as New Zealanders, we are fundamentally and subconsciously programmed to think that the 2020 general elections will be a contest between the National and Labour party. There are a few popular minor parties at the helm too – the Greens, New Zealand First and ACT, including the Maori Party with all of them having been in the parliament before. But most voters must be forgiven as they will struggle to name any other party beyond this point, well there are 16 other registered political parties!

They are generally referred to as the outliers – the term instantly labels them as differentiated; odd alternatives who are not to be taken seriously. But any election needs smaller alternate voices and visions which may be fairly difficult to be at the forefront keeping in mind that the larger political parties will see their rise and tarnish them. They will dismiss them as fake or flaky and conspiracy theorists spreading false information, simply because these smaller fronts have different viewpoints as they question mainstream parties and take up against the state.

“To see this happening, you only need to look at how the Advance NZ/NZ Public Party is currently being written off as a political movement by the commentariat for being conspiracy theorists spreading disinformation”, says Claire Robinson reporter from the Guardian.

It is next to impossible to get any mainstream media to cover their events or rallies or give them prime time space on television other than being looked at with a myopic lens of being unworthy. Right up to the point where the current government is part of the duopoly that controls the campaign funding for the advertising in favour of the country’s major political parties. This funding is severely restricted for new or smaller parties which is a starting point to inequality with powerful bureaucracy dictating norms.

But this new party which does not come from a place of power or privilege that other parties enjoy, gathered the momentum using the alternate power of the digital medium. Over the last few months, Billy has been speaking to increasingly large crowds through his Facebook platform, reaching the provinces and building up an immense social media profile touching individuals far beyond the target market reach. “This moment has risen like a tsunami from the silent ones”, says Billy. People have been woken up and start seeing reality as an absolute and not an alternate.

But, amid the claims and counterclaims, a fact remains that as access to internet data becomes increasingly easier and the demographic profile of users continues to expand, social media will witness more and more political colours and increasing diversity in the country.

What appeals to me most is that we are working on forming alliances with other smaller parties with diverse cultural ethnicities where each could keep their independence, structure and leadership under the combined banner. “If we ever want to take on the established parties, we must unite together,” said Ross, saying bygones could be bygones.

Te Kahika will be running in the Māori electorate of Te Tai Tokerau, and while it is a long shot, it is not entirely beyond the realm of possibility that he could win it. The area has long been impoverished, particularly for those who are Māori, and successive changes in representatives hasn’t changed that. Why shouldn’t the voters take a punt on someone offering something very different?

The strategy from here could also give Advance NZ (the party under whose banner the two parties will be running) an outside chance at the 5% MMP threshold, one seat is all it takes to be heard. The aim is to create a “centrist version” of the Alliance, which gained significant support to the left of Labour in the 1990s, says Alex Braae from Spinoff.

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