Keeping old notes

Student Jacinda Ardern was most likely to become Prime Minister

Ardern condolences to Muslims who lost their relatives in the racist massacre.

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Old notes about New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern while she was a student at Morensville College in 1998 reveal that this teenager was on her way to lead the country.

When she was only 18 years old, her colleagues chose her, in a sort of ballot on the merits of some student personalities, that she was likely to become prime minister in the future.

She won in the polls advantages that no other student has, which are the best-looking, friendliest, happiest, most sports-loving, most cheerful, loudest, and most likely to succeed.

Ardern told the Fox Herald that she only won the vote "because I was the only person who cared about politics at school."

"This is a natural assumption where I ended up, but I also thought that I would be a policeman," she says, but it seems that this young woman, in her early years, made no secret of her desire to become a leader.

Disclosure of the goal

In an interview with a local newspaper in 1997, she stated her goal of becoming New Zealand's first female prime minister, after being named a winner of the Waikato Regional Competition in a competition organized by the United Nations for New Zealand.

In the interview, she explained how her passion for public speaking can serve her well in politics.

The focus of her talk was that drug abuse is the scourge of humanity.

Ardern argued that the United Nations needs to allocate more resources to fight drug addiction.

And while Ardern couldn't fulfill her dream of becoming New Zealand's first female prime minister - that honor went to her mentor Helen Clark - she broke many barriers during her time in office.

But when she first took office in 2017, she became the world's youngest female prime minister, aged 37 at the time.

And she made history as one of the few women to have given birth to children while in power.

It has since been praised for its aggressive and serious handling of catastrophic events, including the Christchurch terrorist attack, the White Island volcano disaster, and the Coronavirus pandemic.

The only child

Growing up, Ardern was a far cry from the serious leadership she would later gain.

She was the only child of a father of a police officer and a mother who worked in a school cafeteria.

I grew up in a conservative environment that encourages dressing modestly and avoiding coffee, cigarettes and alcohol.

Although she may not have stood out from her peers, her teachers always saw signs of leadership in her actions.

Everybody at the school expected it to be a great thing.

After graduating from the University of Waikato with a BA in Communication Studies in Public Relations and Political Science, she worked for then Prime Minister Helen Clark's government.

Advisor

After that, Ardern moved to London, where she worked as a senior political advisor to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

In 2007, she was elected president of the International Socialist Youth Union, a political organization that fights for freedom, social justice and democracy.

While presiding over the 2009 annual meeting of the World Federation Council, her socialist views were made clear.

During this time, she entered the New Zealand Parliament as a member of the Labor Party list.

Over the years she became known as an advocate for women and children, and spoke a lot about the New Zealand education system.

During this time the Labor Party was fighting at the polls.

The party was looking for an easy third term thanks to the inconsistency of leadership within the Labor Party.

Leader Andrew Little was unpopular in the polls, and there was talk of Ardern stepping in to play that role.

But Ardern was young, and she had no desire to take the lead.

In 2014, she said, "I realized how difficult the obstacles raising a family had placed before me, which prevented me from playing this role."

"I don't want to be the prime minister," she said in 2015.

Then in 2017, while she was on her way to becoming an MP for the Oakland Mount Albert constituency, she was elected a new leader of the Labor Party.

Less than two months before the polls closed, Ardern scored a stunning victory, becoming New Zealand's most popular prime minister in more than 100 years, after leading the country through a series of crises.

Ardern responded seriously to the "Covid-19" virus, which made New Zealand one of the most successful countries in containing the virus, and this earned it a popularity of 59.5% as the preferred leader of the Pacific nation, according to a poll organized by the NewsHub Red Research Foundation.

New Zealand has been in lockdown for more than a month under the Level 4 restrictions, which were eventually reduced to Level 3 in late April.

Businesses, including malls, cinemas, cafes and gyms reopened in the country last week, although strict social distancing measures continue to be enforced across the country to prevent the risk of a large-scale outbreak.

On March 15 of last year, a white fanatic carried out two successive mass shootings at mosques, killing 51 people and wounding dozens.

Ardern wore a black scarf as a sign of solidarity with Muslims and an expression of her grief for their relatives, and promised to cover the funeral costs of those who died.

Later that year, on December 9, the White Island volcano in Bay of Plenty erupted, killing 21 people and leaving many with severe burns.

Ardern received praise for her compassion and composure at press conferences as she dealt with the crisis and solidarity with families, and was the first to respond.

Growing up, Ardern was a far cry from the serious leadership she would later gain.

Although she may not have been prominent among her peers, her teachers always noticed signs of leadership in her actions.

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