Ben Bell new Mayor "of" Gore, Farmer or Pharma?
Watch this one, I think it has a few twists in its tail
Tracey Hicks most likely took his role as Mayor for granted. In 2019 he was elected unopposed. This year in a tight Mayoral contest he has lost to 23yo Ben Bell who seems to be from Tauranga (or Wellington) rather than Gore (he says he has lived in Gore for 18 months) and who definitely thinks that being a Mayor is a job that starts after 5pm as he says that he has a business to run. My question would be if he’s not planning to be a working Mayor but more a promotional one, who exactly is the working Mayor going to be?
I don’t have an answer for that right now but I will note that Ben Bell is not exactly lacking for publicity over the last few years (here, here). As you can see on one of those links he was awarded Youth Wellingtonian of the year in 2016.
Leverage, a digital marketing firm, in Wellington is claiming involvement.
And then there’s this story;
He’s so far being living one big charmed life.
What are those wellbands about? More dystopian details here. But you should keep in mind that there never was a website for them, this seems to have been more about promotion of Ben Bell than it does about tracking devices for hospital patients.
One suspects that his team, whoever they may be, targeted Gore specifically.
It may be of some interest that both him and his Team Hokonui campaign mate, Joe Stringer, are in the IT field.
The Mayor for the last 18 years, Tracey Hicks, has today stated that he is going to challenge the result. As you can see in the linked story, Anthony Morton of Electionz has confirmed that the votes were all counted by machine. Anthony isn’t currently answering any of my questions either btw.
I think if Tracey Hicks does his research here that there is a twist yet to come in this tale of the Gore Mayoralty race. For one judging by the reference to his website here;
One has to wonder if he has a connection to Pharma via this outfit;
For two I suspect maybe an IT connection to the result which is ultimately under the control of Civica in the UK.
And maybe it’s time for South Islanders to start standing for North Island positions. As there’s plenty doing it the other way around.
I’m not sending to Twitter anymore (I’m shadowbanned) but you’re welcome to.
#gorenews #nzpol #benbell #traceyhicks
Great post. Very interesting... Maybe this kid is on the fast track to be a shiny new addition to your "Young Global Leader" list.