At the close of one of the most robustly democratic processes we’ve seen in a good long while, New Zealand has chosen their new flag: their old one.
Despite having a write-in option for citizens to submit their own options, which turned out to be a delightful roundabout of lasers, ferns and MS Paint (‘Laser Kiwi‘ was our personal fav), the options came down to this:
Silver fern flag, designed by Kyle Lockwood:
And the OG flag:
The results came down to 56.6% of New Zealanders (1,200,003 votes) choosing the old flag, and 43.2% (915,008 votes) for Lockwood’s Silver Fern flag.
New Zealanders have decided… #nzflag pic.twitter.com/ND85D84pFL
— nzherald (@nzherald) March 24, 2016
Prime Minister John Key had long campaigned for the flag change, but said of the decision that New Zealanders should embrace the change and “more importantly, be proud of it”.
Source: The Guardian.
