Britain’s Union Jack will continue to adorn New Zealand’s flag for some time yet, after a pro-nationalist group abandoned a petition for a change, news reports said on Thursday.
The campaigners said they had collected only 100 000 signatures, well short of the 270 000 they needed to force a referendum on the issue.
”Apathy was the winner again,” said campaign organiser Lloyd Morrison, who claimed opinion polls showed that up to three out of five New Zealanders wanted to dump the 105-year-old flag in favour of a distinctive national design.
He said the task of getting enough signatures was impossible after Telecom and New Zealand Post backed out of a controversial plan to post the petition to 1,4-million households, apparently after complaints from shareholders and customers.
Morrison proposed a silver fern on a black background to replace the existing blue flag with the Union Jack in the top left hand corner, which he says bears the seal of New Zealand’s past as a British colony.
Campaigners say that with the four stars of the Southern Cross constellation, it is also easily confused with Australia’s flag which has the Union Jack and six stars representing its states.
Morrison said he believed that the issue would not go away and New Zealanders would eventually choose a flag that uniquely represented the country for both its past and hopes for its future. – Sapa-DPA