Chris Hipkins Is Officially Confirmed As The Prime Minister Of New Zealand

Chris Hipkins has officially been confirmed on Sunday as New Zealand’s next prime minister and he chose Carmel Sepuloni as his deputy.

The appointment of Carmel Sepuloni as Chris Hipkins’ deputy on Sunday was the first time someone with Pacific Island ancestry has held the position of prime minister in New Zealand.

After being the only candidate to run in the election to succeed Jacinda Ardern, who surprised the country on Thursday by announcing her resignation after serving as the leader for more than five years, Mr. Hipkins had the unanimous backing of legislators from his Labour Party.

On Wednesday, Mr. Hipkins will take the oath of office to assume his new position. Less than nine months will pass before he runs in a difficult general election in which opinion surveys show that his party is falling behind the conservative opposition.

The absence of other candidates for party leader suggested that the party had united behind Mr. Hipkins to prevent a protracted election and any indication of division in the wake of Ms. Ardern’s resignation.

In outlining his priorities, Mr. Hipkins stated that the economy will be at the forefront of his government’s considerations because he was aware that many families were struggling as a result of the “pandemic of inflation.”

When asked if he would adopt the same transformative strategy for governance that Ms. Ardern had pledged when she first assumed the top position, Mr. Hipkins said he wanted to go back to the fundamentals.

“We will deliver a very solid government that is focused on the bread-and-butter issues that matter to New Zealanders, and that is relevant to the times that we are in now,” Mr. Hipkins said. “2017 was five-and-a-half years ago, and quite a lot has happened since then.”

Ms. Sepuloni, who entered politics for the first time 15 years ago like Mr. Hipkins, most recently assumed the portfolios of social development and employment as one of the government’s top ministers.

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A working-class girl from a small New Zealand village becoming deputy prime minister, she claimed, was “quite hard to imagine.”

Ms. Sepuloni stated it was “very hard to fathom that a working-class girl” from a small New Zealand town could end up as deputy prime minister.

“I want to acknowledge the significance of this for our Pacific community,” Ms. Sepuloni said. “I am proudly Samoan, Tongan, and New Zealand European, and represent generations of New Zealanders with mixed heritage.”

Ms. Sepuloni reported that she has already been inundated with inspirational comments about yet another glass ceiling being broken.

According to reports, opposition leader Christopher Luxon texted Mr. Hipkins to express his congratulations. However, Mr. Luxon asserted that Mr. Hipkins and Ms. Sepuloni were members of a government that had “failed terribly” to accomplish its goals and that, despite the change in leadership, things would continue to run as they had before.