December 2021 Minister of Engagement special election
 | ||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
| Registered | 92 legislators of the South Pacific | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turnout | 34.78% | |||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
The December 2021 Minister of Engagement special election was an election held in the South Pacific from 17‒26 December 2021 to elect a new Minister of Engagement following the resignation of incumbent Tisha. The seat was only contested by Purple Hyacinth, who defeated the Re-Open Nominations option in a landslide.
Background
Cabinet positions usually are elected concurrently every four months. However, should an incumbent resign and more than half of the term remain, a special election for the post must be held.
Incumbent Tisha was elected in the October 2021 Cabinet election. In early November, her previously high inactivity on the regional Discord server rapidly declined with no prior notice of a Leave of Absence communicated to either Prime Minister HumanSanity or Ministry senior staff. After repeated inquiry by the Prime Minister, she explained to be on a leave due to real-life work. Later, she briefly returned and held constructive discussion about the Ministry with the Prime Minister and senior staffer Purple Hyacinth, but soon disappeared again, with an explanation again only provided after explicit and repeated inquiry. After once more returning, but not advancing work within the Ministry, and two incidents of sending region-wide on-site telegrams, HumanSanity decided to revoke her Regional Officer privileges by way of Cabinet Order.[1][2]
Minister Tisha erroneously believed this to constitute complete removal from office,[1] and left the region and the Discord server in anger. Her official resignation from all her offices was tendered to the Assembly later the same day.[3] As the half-term line had not yet been reached by mere days, a special election had to be called.
Electoral System
The office of the Minister of Engagement is a Cabinet office, all of which are to be elected using Instant-Runoff voting. A voter ranks as many of the standing candidates as they wish in descending order of preference; the worst-performing candidates are eliminated from the tally one after the other and the votes for them re-distributed according to the voters' preferences until a candidate has attained an absolute majority of votes.
Candidate
The sole candidate running in the election was Purple Hyacinth, a former Chair of the Assembly who had only recently returned to activity. Quebecshire, Evinea, and Not Austria declined their nominations, while BlockBuster2K43, USoVietnam, Aumeltopia, Tin the Free, and Nakari never responded to theirs.[4]
| Declared Candidates | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bolded candidates are incumbents. Italicized candidates withdrew from the election. | ||||
| Candidate | Political office(s) | Campaign | ||
|
Purple Hyacinth | Member of the South Pacific Coral Guard (since January 2021) Other offices
Cabinet Advisor Senior Staff in the Ministry of Culture Senior Staff in the Ministry of Engagement Senior Staff in the Ministry of Media Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs OWL Senior Staff |
Rebuilding the Ministry[5] | |
Campaign
Purple Hyacinth produced a record-length campaign, sitting at over 4,300 words in length. In it, she explained her plans for creating a solid foundation for the Ministry in great detail. She described her primary focus to be a better engagement of staffers, mainly by increasing their independence while still keeping an eye on project progress; by this, she hoped to build a long-term sustainable productive atmosphere within the Ministry. To this end, she planned to have a number of internal guides written, so that new staff members could easily join and contribute to projects. For public transparency and accountability, both she as Minister and her staffers would post progress updates regularly. In addition to the existing projects she'd continue, Purple Hyacinth listed a few one-off projects, including a cross-endorsement and executive recruitment event. She lastly addressed possible concerns regarding falling to inactivity again (which triggered the August 2021 Chair of the Assembly election).[5]
Results
On the 26th of December, 2021, Election Commissioner Kris Kringle proclaimed the results of the election, and certified them on the 2nd of January, 2022.[6]
| Results: First Round of IRV | ||
|---|---|---|
| Green background denotes winning candidates. Red background denotes eliminated candidates. ✓ and ✗ denote the status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively. | ||
| Candidate | First-Place Preferences | |
| Purple Hyacinth | 30 | 96.77% |
| Re-Open Nominations | 1 | 3.23% |
| Invalid ballots | 1 | 3.13% |
Thus, Purple Hyacinth was elected to the office, with her term set to expire together with the other Cabinet ministers' after the February 2022 Cabinet election.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 HumanSanity (16 Dec '21): Information for the Assembly & Recall Motion for the Minister of Engagement. Assembly of the South Pacific. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.
- ↑ PM HumanSanity (15 Dec '21): Cabinet Order 9 | The Prime Minister modifies Regional Officer portfolios of the Cabinet. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.
- ↑ PenguinPies (17 Dec '21): RE: Information for the Assembly & Recall Motion for the Minister of Engagement. Assembly of the South Pacific. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.
- ↑ EC Kris Kringle (17 Dec '21): Declarations of Candidacy. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Purple Hyacinth (19 Dec '21): Purple Hyacinth for MoE: Rebuilding the Ministry. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.
- ↑ EC Kris Kringle (26 Dec '21): Proclamation of Results. Retrieved 7 Feb '22.