In the run-up to the November election, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews is trying hard to shed his ‘Dictator Dan’ moniker and redefine himself.
The tag had followed Mr Andrews during Victoria’s numerous Covid-19 lockdowns, which had lasted almost two years.
Victorians will go to the polls in November to vote in the first election since they were imprisoned in their houses for a world record-breaking time on the Premier’s orders.
Most people will have forgotten about the dark hardship of winter and the state’s world record breaking lockdown tally by then.
Mr Andrews has tried to show a gentler side to his personality this year, mocking WAG Bec Judd when she raised crime worries in her lush area and acting almost human in a tweet commemorating his 50th birthday.
When he returned to work after a serious fall, he donned his The North Face jacket, which Victorians had grown to despise due to recurrent lockdowns.
Mr Andrews appeared on the red carpet with his family for the premiere of Hamilton at Her Majesty’s Theatre in March.
He revealed the loss of his pet cat Felix in April.
Last October 21, Melburnians were liberated from their sixth lockdown.
Most of their political lockdown captives’ recognized faces have now been forgotten – or silenced.
Four of Victoria’s most senior government ministers have now resigned from their positions ahead of the November 26 election.
Former Deputy Premier and Education Minister James Merlino, Health Minister Martin Foley, Police Minister Lisa Neville, and Sports Minister Martin Pakula are among those appointed.
Each of these performed critical roles in ensuring Victoria’s shutdown for 262 days. They all agreed that their departure had nothing to do with removing the scars of their memory from the Victorian people ahead of the election.
‘I didn’t get healthy enough to leave.’ ‘I became healthy enough to come back to work, to complete what we began, not what I started, but what we started,’ Mr Andrews said at the time.
‘There is change, refreshment, and renewal, and that is crucial to any team, especially if it is to be the greatest team it can be.’
Each had observed and forgotten how Covid-19 escaped from the state’s quarantine hotels, condemning Victorians to curfews, home schooling, and playground prohibitions.
While the Andrews administration’s terrible response to the Covid-19 outbreak will live on in history books forever, it has come under fire in the months after it put the state into billions of dollars in debt.
The voters don’t appear to have noticed. Only a few months ago, it was discovered that Andrews’ administration was facing new corruption investigations and pending court charges related to Victorian Labor and his own socialist left group.
Robert Redlich, the chairman of the Independent Broad-based Anti-Corruption Commission, told AFR that he was “very upset” that he couldn’t share the status of other investigations.
‘There are additional investigations that, unfortunately, I am still unable to discuss that shed light on these concerns,’ Mr Redlich added.
These included ongoing prosecutions and sentencing proceedings for “a number of election officers.”
It follows public IBAC hearings regarding claims of branch stacking under the Andrews administration.
According to the AFR, Mr Andrews was the subject of multiple corruption investigations, as well as a WorkSafe investigation into his private office over allegations of bullying.
Despite major worries about Mr Andrews’ tenure, his chances of re-election have been boosted by his insipid, bungling, and similarly dubious opposition.
Just last week, opposition leader Matthew Guy was forced to defend himself against claims of corruption when his chief of staff, Mitch Catlin, was caught soliciting a party contributor for more than $100,000 in payments to his private firm.
Mr Guy, who was reported to the police by the state government in connection with the case, reacted angrily when Mr Andrews’ lackies requested him to ‘come clean’ about it.
‘We cherish honesty… ‘I will not be lectured on honesty by this administration,’ Mr Guy declared during a passionate news conference.
‘I will not be lectured by a fundamentally crooked administration.’
Mr Andrews struck another home run on Wednesday when Mr Guy’s head of communications unexpectedly resigned.
Then, on Thursday, his diary manager resigned, making him the third member of his staff to go. Over the last two years, the Liberal Party has had its own public relations nightmare.
Former party leader Michael O’Brien was accused of throwing pot shots from the cheap seats during Victoria’s lockdowns before being replaced by Mr Guy, who charmed the public with some impassioned lockdown remarks, late last year.
Shortly after, opposition attorney general Tim Smith rammed his automobile into a fence while inebriated behind the wheel.
A Roy Morgan Snap SMS Poll conducted last month predicted that Labor will win another term with 59.5 percent of the vote on a two-party preferred basis.
The study found a 2.2% gain in support for the ALP since the 2018 election, which it won with 57.3 percent of the vote on a two-party preferred basis.
It was the same month that it was reported that anti-lockdown’rebels’ detained, imprisoned, and fined during the lockdown were being discreetly let off the hook in the run-up to the election.
Prosecutors cited a lack of “public interest” in carrying out cases as one of the main reasons.
One lawyer speculated that it had more to do with Mr Andrews deleting history in the run-up to November.
‘It seems to be a belated effort to quell community outrage about police behavior during the epidemic in the run-up to the election,’ he added.
‘A jury trial would have served as a reminder.’
Mr Andrews’ favorite The Age newspaper published a blistering editorial article on Thursday, reminding Victorians how badly he botched his pandemic response.
A image of Victoria Police officers standing over an elderly guy sitting alone on the beach accompanied the post.
And one that ‘Dictator Dan’ is working hard to erase from Victorian minds.