One of New Zealand’s leading morning broadcasters called Jacinda Ardern “shady” and alleged she sought to exploit a natural calamity to avoid answering questions about her own administration.
In a heated live television interview on Monday, AM Show anchor Ryan Bridge quizzed Ms. Ardern about serious accusations made by renegade MP Gaurav Sharma.
After a week of dramatic but unfounded charges, Mr. Sharma has subsequently become the first New Zealand Labour MP to be ejected from the caucus in more than ten years.
In addition to the party room dilemma, Ms. Ardern is also dealing with a natural catastrophe in the South Island city of Nelson, where a week of extreme weather caused significant flooding and damage that left many citizens homeless.
She grinned through a slew of probing questions during the interview on Monday before criticising Bridge for diverting attention from the Nelson situation.
When Ms. Ardern stated, “I’m here surrounded by hundreds of families who have lost their homes, I’m conscious that you’re here asking questions about one person.”
No one should be concentrating on this right now. To settle things properly and in the right manner, we should enter mediation. It is regrettable that the offer was not accepted.
Before charging her staff of being dishonest, Bridge recognised the seriousness of the Nelson problem.
He said, “I think most people would find it a bit dodgy to suggest that we shouldn’t be questioning you about very serious allegations about your office on the premise that there’s been a tragedy in Nelson.”
Asserting that she had been misinterpreted, Ms. Ardern intervened.
“No,” I said. That has nothing to do with you. You misunderstand, if I may say so,” she remarked.
“My argument was that an MP should not take advantage of the chance to get into mediation.” That is where we should be addressing these problems.
Prior to being asked whether the rogue MP “was lying or made it made it up,” she was questioned about Dr. Sharma’s assertion that government MPs were trained how to evade public scrutiny.
Look, I’ve never in this circumstance repeated accusations and believed it would be advantageous for anybody to engage in a tit for tat.
Because of this, we have kept the door open for Gaurav to win back the confidence of his colleagues and return to a situation where everyone can concentrate on performing their jobs.
After the heated exchange with the prime minister went viral on TikTok, Bridge has since received an abundance of accolades.
“This man is amazing!” always shuts her down,” a viewer said.
“Maximum respect to Ryan, and a true gentleman about it,” said another.
Ryan deserves a significant wage raise, wrote a third.
On August 11, Dr. Sharma wrote an opinion article in a major newspaper accusing the New Zealand parliament of “rampant bullying,” which set off a string of assaults on his own party.
Then, he stepped up and widened his criticisms, slamming Labour’s leadership for what he called a bullying culture and Parliamentary Services for poor management.
At a meeting in the party room on Tuesday, Labour MPs decided to expel Dr. Sharma, who was previously barred from the caucus.
Dr. Sharma was ejected, according to Ms. Ardern, for “repeated and intentional violations of caucus rules” that “completely undermined the faith of his fellow Labour MPs.”
As she was on her way to the caucus meeting on Tuesday, Ms. Ardern said, “He has obviously made remarks that are simply untrue.”
“That extremely unsettling to me.”
Dr. Sharma is now debating whether to continue serving in parliament or to resign early and call for a by-election.