That's the only way to describe National's actions in appointing a crown observer to the Wellington City Council. Wellington didn't vote for National. They elected a council which supports public transport, housing intensification, and making Wellington a nicer place for people to live (rather than landlords and house hoarders to bank capital gains). So they've started the process to overthrow that council, using the disruption created by National's own proxies on the council as a justification. Which sounds an awful lot like Putin's tactics of using "instability" caused by local proxies to justify invasion...
But its not just Wellington. The Otago Regional Council is trying to pass a land and water plan which will protect its rivers. The government has just decided to legislate to stop them from doing so - and of course it will have retrospective effect (a favourite tactic of this government). In Auckland, they're trying to over-rule the Auckland Council's commitment to safe speed limits, so they can hoon to the airport in their government limos. In Canterbury they seem to be gearing up to overthrow local democracy to steal the water again. And then there's all those councils who want to keep their Māori wards...
it seems that rather than being committed to localism, National wants to micromanage our councils from Wellington. And if voters disagree, well, they'll just stop us from voting. Which probably sounds fine to them - except (so far) we can still vote in 2026, and we should take the opportunity to vote these anti-democratic authoritarian tyrants out on their arses.
