New Zealand Labour Party chooses ex-UN man as leader

Dec 12, 2011, 23:43 GMT

Wellington - A former United Nations chief who has worked in some of the world's top hotspots, including Iraq, Lebanon and Jerusalem, was elected Tuesday as leader of New Zealand's opposition Labour Party.

David Shearer, 54, was chosen by Labour's 34 members of parliament to replace former foreign minister Phil Goff, who resigned after the party suffered its worst-ever drubbing at a general election last month.

Shearer, a political tyro who has been in parliament only two-and-a-half years, defeated his more experienced rival David Cunliffe in a closely-fought ballot.

A majority of their colleagues decided that he was the best man to lift the party out of the political doldrums and return them to power at the next election in 2014.

Labour legislators went for a new broom approach in the party's battle with the conservative National Party, which won a second three-year term at the November 26 election, selecting Grant Robertson, an openly gay backbencher who has been in parliament only since 2008, as Shearer's deputy.

Shearer was deputy head of the UN mission and deputy head of the UN Development Programme in Iraq until entering parliament in June 2009, when he won a by-election for the Auckland seat vacated by Helen Clark, who headed Labour governments as prime minister from 1999-2008.