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Clark gov't ousted in NZ
 New Zealand's Prime Minister-elect John Key, a wealthy, conservative former financier will start to form a new government. Key, the 47-year-old leader of the conservative National Party, swept easily to power in this South Pacific country of 4.1 million people, ousting Prime Minister Helen Clark's Labor Party after nine years in office. "I'm very confident we can work our way through it. I'm very confident about our policies, our positions," Key said after his victory speech to jubilant supporters in Auckland on Saturday. The National Party won 45.5 percent of the vote, or 59 seats in the 122-seat Parliament. Key will have a majority with the support of allies the right-wing ACT Party with five seats and one more from United Future's Peter Dunne. New Zealand's farming export-dependent economy fell into recession early this year, and Key said the worldwide downturn is the immediate problem for the country. Key has promised a more right-leaning government than Clark's, which for almost a decade made global warming a key policy issue. Posted by: Fred 2008-11-09 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=254708 |