SIX COUNCILS BID

A Nelson man is seeking to become the mayor of six South Island councils in this year’s local body election, while a Canterbury mayor will not have to campaign because no-one is challenging her for the mayoral chains.

Nominations for October’s local body elections – where people can run to be a local councillor, community board member or mayor – closed at 12 noon yesterday.

In Canterbury, the Hurunui District Council confirmed only one person lodged a nomination for mayor, the incumbent Marie Black, so she will serve another three years.

A similar situation of no mayoral election looked likely to pan out in Waimakariri as one hour before the deadline, current mayor Dan Gordon was the only mayoral nomination.

The Waimakariri District Council is yet to provide a finalised list of candidates, but Gordon said he understood that he had one other challenger.

One of the more startling revelations from the nominations is that a Nelson man is seeking to be the mayor of six South Island councils.

St Arnaud farmer Richard Osmaston, who is campaigning on a moneyless economy, wants to be the mayor in Westland, Grey, Buller, Marlborough, Nelson, and Tasman.

Osmaston said the councils had a lot of problems, which all had the same root cause – the money system.

‘‘The fact that we use money as our basic operating system means that everyone is continuously competing, continuously having to grow, and continuously having to focus on getting money, rather than what’s actually important,’’ he said.

Osmaston said taking care of the environment and each other were what was important.

In the long-term Osmaston wanted a society where everything is free and everything is voluntary.

He said it was actually anarchy – which refers to a society with no governance – but he said he was using that word carefully as it had been ‘‘bastardised’’ over the past 100 years.

Osmaston has run previously to be the mayor of Grey and Nelson, but this is the first time he has run to be mayor in more than one district.

Stuff has asked Local Government New Zealand whether one person can be a mayor in two districts, but it is yet to respond.

In Christchurch, 11 people have put their name forward to be the city’s next mayor, including Nikora Nitro, who previously ran unsuccessfully to be a city councillor during the 2021 Coastal by-election.

Nitro has been accused of a longrunning history of making false promises to business owners, failing to pay staff, and failing to pay rent for premises that his businesses operate from.

The other candidates are Phil Mauger, David Meates, Carl Bromley, The Wizard, Mark Chirnside, Stephen Jelley, Drucilla Kingi-Patterson, Sam Park, Peter Wakeman and Tubby Hansen.

Hansen has run in Christchurch’s local body elections since 1971 and often draws attention and raises eyebrows with his wacky voting blurbs, which The Spinoff once described as ‘‘precious works of art’’.

He is also running for council and community board in the Spreydon ward.

In Hornby, Destiny Church leader and local anti-mandate protest leader Derek Tait will run for council and community board.

Meanwhile, further south, Tim Cadogan will continue as mayor of Central Otago as no-one else put their hand up to challenge him for the role.

In Dunedin, 10 people want to be the next mayor, including the incumbent Green-aligned Aaron Hawkins.