New Flag

Currently New Zealand is deciding whether to change it’s official flag. It started a few years ago when the prime minister announced that he wants to start a process of changing the official flag. He listed several reasons for that:

1. The Australian and New Zealand flags are very similar.
2. The union jack in the left top corner recalls the period of New Zealand history when it was a colony of Great Britain.
3. People and businesses commonly use a branch of silver fern as a symbol of New Zealand so the current flag doesn’t seem to represent the country anymore.

The initiative was thought through and it became a standard democratic process with several stages. Initially, a special committee gathered the public’s opinion about a symbol of the country. Koru, silver fern and the southern cross were the frontrunners. The PM himself suggested a silver fern on a black background. I think it looks very cool and stylish but some people find similarities with the flag of ISIS which is not the best team to be on.

The second step was to gather flag designs from people or in other words everybody could propose their own option. As a result, about ten thousand flag designs were sent to the committee. Next, the committee went through the whole list and selected the 40 best options and it was called: the long list. At this stage I started to notice in social media some public resentment saying that none of these options are desired as a new flag.

Then the committee produced a short list of four flag designs that were supposed to be offered for ranking on a referendum this November. The four flag designs include three styles of silver fern and one style of koru. However, another fifth option appeared later when some activists started to promote it. It’s called “red peak” and has no typical New Zealand symbols on it. I saw a lot of activity on Facebook and Twitter where people wanted the red peak as an option for the November referendum. For example, there were stickers passed out with the red peak or people on the streets of Wellington with the actual flag so passerS-by could take a photo of themselves with it for social media. Finally, the parliament voted to include red peak as an option for referendum in November.

Another referendum in February will be held where the winner among the five options will go up against the old flag so I’m anxious to know what choice the people of New Zealand will finally make.

From time to time I hear a lot of discussions about the initiative where people don’t want to change the flag at all. They are not happy that the country is spending millions of dollars when there are more serious issues to spend money on while the old flag still suits it’s purpose.