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| Sunday, November 11, 2001, updated at 22:00(GMT+8) |
Analysis: Boatpeople, Terrorists Help Howard in Election |
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Australian Prime Minister John Howard won the general election Saturday night thanks to the waves of Asylum seekers and international terrorism.
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Australian Prime Minister John Howard won the general election Saturday night thanks to the waves of Asylum seekers and international terrorism.
Before the Tampa crisis late August, his Liberal-National Coalition was clearly underdog in rivaling the Opposition Labor Party. The Australian average people were almost casting him aside due to the 10 percent consumption tax his government introduced last year. Understanding the serious situation, he resorted to throwing bounty but failed to harvest apparent results.
At this moment, a wonderful chance fell from the heaven. The Norwegian cargo Tampa rescued 433 boatpeople heading for Australia. As a canny politician, Howard seized the opportunity and refused Tampa to enter the country's waters and created a storm in a tea cup. He managed to set up "boatpeople colonies" in the Pacific nations and the navy intercepted and drove back all people smuggling boats. Public opinion polls showed the action won the support from more than 70 percent of Australians.
On September 11, terrorist attacks occurred in the United States killing around 5,000 people. It shocked the world. Australians were thrown into extreme panic. People reviewed the Tampa crisis and believed Howard did correctly and timely. Howard fanned the flame saying that "You don't know who's coming and you don't know whether they do have terrorist links or not." He promised voters a live in the secure hands and said he had the capability to see the nation through the difficult time.
The election history in the country showed that in times of trouble, voters usually inclined to avoid from changing a ruler.
However, there were unspoken factors behind the victory of the Coalition. According to the fragment comments by the local media, in the society there are sentiments of insularism, isolationism or even racialism, more or less. They are remnants of the white Australia policy, which was repealed only about 30 years ago. However senior political commentator Paul Kelly named it cautiously "protectionist nationalism."
In 1998, the One Nation Party arose and in this year's election it captured about one million votes from the Coalition.
The party is seen a semi-racialist political group. It attacked bluntly the Asian immigrants and opposed aid to Asian countries and the economic globalization. Mainly because of its racialist color, the party fell quickly from its peak.
The Howard government's policy seems much more acceptable though the One Nation Party leader Pauline Hanson cried out that Howard stole her policy. Last night a defeated One Nation candidate in Western Australia blamed a flow of Pauline Hanson votes back to the coalition for his failure to secure a senate position in Western Australia.
He was quoted by the Australian Associated Press as saying that "I think in parts Howard had adopted some of our policy and people thought: 'Oh, the Liberal Party's woken up, we'll go back to them'."
There are concerns that Australia is becoming more insular and whiter. But the protectionist nationalism sounds more appropriate.
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