The controversial ex-PM of Australia Tony Abbot has lost his Sydney North Shore seat to an independent candidate, Olympic skier Zali Steggall!
- The former Australian PM Tony Abbott could not retain his seat in this election.
- He was defeated on his home turf and lost his ultra-safe seat to Olympic skier Zali Steggall.
Tony Abbott loses his seat in the Australian election in 2019
This Saturday, elections were held in Australia for the Parliament and the former PM of Australia Tony Abbott has miserably lost his seat.
An independent candidate and Olympic skier named Zali Steggall defeated him and ousted him from his so-called ultra-safe seat. The seat was in Sydney’s wealthy North Shore and with it, Tony Abbott’s 25 years of parliamentary career comes to an end.
The details of the election result
Zali Steggall defeated Tony Abbott, 61 by 13%. Zali is a lawyer and a former Olympic skier. On incorporating the preference flows from the minor parties, Tony had a score of 41% against Zali’s 59%, the Australian Election Commission declared.
Tony Abbott and his reaction to his defeat
Tony accepted his defeat in the evening and congratulated Zali for his great win. He said to his supporters:
“The good news is much more important than the bad news. The good news is that there is every chance that the Liberal-National coalition has won this election. Scott Morrison will now quite rightly enter the Liberal pantheon forever.’’
He was happy seeing the strong performance of the government and felt that Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s campaign was a highly effective one. Tony also justified and downplayed his loss saying:
“What’s best for the country is not who wins or loses Warringah. But who forms or does not form a government in Canberra. And tonight we can be extraordinarily confident, more confident than we ever had any right to expect, that we will have continued good Liberal-National government.’’
Tony Abbott and his controversial image
Tony served as the PM of Australia from September 2013 but only for two years. His party men dumped him during a party-room coup. He is a hardcore right-wing activist of his party and then Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard called him a misogynist in 2012.
He had first on the Warringah seat in 1994. This time it seems there was a well-funded successful campaign against him to get him out of the seat.
The opposition and media and also his party people have targeted Tony over the past few years for his controversial views. He has been at the receiving end and has been heavily criticized by many. People were not in favor of his arch-conservative views.
He had expressed doubt about climate change and also opposed same-sex marriages. He had also reinstated the Australian nation’s archaic honors system of giving appointments to knights and dames.
Tony was also not in the good books of his party. His party members had removed him as the Liberal Leader. And though he was still in the Parliament, he was a backbencher. But he used to aggressively criticize the policy-making and its position by his moderator successor, Malcolm Turnbull.
The reactions of the people and other politicians to Tony Abbott’s seat loss
Labor lawmaker Anthony Albanese said:
“This is a slaughter. This is unprecedented,”
“The nature of politics changed under Abbott. It’s come home to roost.”
He added:
“This is the absolute faithful walking away from Tony Abbott.”
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Labor’s shadow treasurer Chris Bowen said:
“I’m a bit of a traditionalist, I’m a bit sad to see a former prime minister go out like that,’’
“I think it would have been better if he had gone of his own accord.’’
Source: Bloomberg
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Posted on: Monday, July 27 2020
