Is the party over for Wikileaks in Australia?
The Australian political party founded by Julian Assange is mired in controversy as the election nears
Kathy Marks
Sunday 25 August 2013
... The catalyst was the revelation last week that in New South Wales, one of three states where WikiLeaks is fielding Senate candidates, the party (mistakenly, it says) has ordained that under Australia’s preferential voting system its votes should be distributed – in the event that its own people are not elected – to the right-wing Shooters and Fishers Party (motto “Protect your freedoms and the future of outdoor sports”) and the white supremacist Australia First Party ...
WikiLeaks also upset the Australian Greens, who have been among Mr Assange’s most vocal supporters. In Western Australia, the party “preferenced” – deliberately – the conservative Nationals ahead of the Greens, even though Scott Ludlam, the Greens senator seeking re-election in that state, travelled to Europe at his own expense in 2011 to discuss Mr Assange’s legal problems with Sweden ...
Mr Assange has said he expects a Senate seat to insulate him from prosecution by US authorities ...
A senior party source suggested that some of those who had quit “thought it was a green-left party, and it’s not … It’s neither left nor right, and it has a strong libertarian streak” ...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/is-the-party-over-for-wikileaks-in-australia-8784281.html