For five years she was considered a decisive force in her country’s politics: courageously and, above all, swiftly determined, she led New Zealand through the pandemic, or through the horror of a terrorist attack on a mosque by a right-wing extremist. in Christchurch. Jacinda Ardern has now announced her resignation just as quickly. In a deeply emotional farewell speech, her country’s most popular politician openly admitted that she no longer had “enough in the tank” to go on and reached out directly to her family. She thanked her partner Clarke Gayford and daughter Neve, whom she gave birth to while in office, calling them “the most self-sacrificing of all of us”. She then told her daughter “I look forward to being there when you start school this year”. And she also made a direct and open suggestion to her husband: “Let’s finally get married.”
More family time
When asked what she plans to do in the future, Ardern only said “spend more time with her family”. But she doesn’t want to give the impression that it’s “political hostility” that is making people give up, but of course it does: “We’re only human too.”
When Ardern was elected Prime Minister in 2017, she became one of the youngest women to head a government at the age of 37.