Mayor new Oceania Vice-President for global Mayors for Peace group
Mayor's column
There are more than 2000 mayors involved with the global Mayors for Peace Movement, and it is an honour for me to be representing Oceania in the movement’s small group of Presidents and Vice-Presidents. It is significant both personally and for the city that Christchurch is home to the Oceania Vice-President. It is an honour I intend to take very seriously.
The Mayors for Peace organisation wants to work towards forcing our governments to rid the world of nuclear weapons by 2020. It’s not about limiting their spread, but rather taking the terrible possibility of war out of the equation.
In an age when it often seems we are falling prey to the politics of terror, I believe it is all the more important that we instead pursue the politics of peace.
This year I will be in Hiroshima, Japan, on Hiroshima Day. There I will give a brief speech calling on more mayors to join this global push for peace. It is a message I am delighted to give.
The Mayors for Peace is a movement that is already rattling governments which either have or aspire to have nuclear weapons.
They can not argue with our message that the world’s cities face the greatest threat from nuclear weapons in the future. From that basis we believe that is totally right to start trying to build real peace at the city level.
In my role I am championing the politics of peace.
This is a profound human movement that is already cutting across borders and boundaries to set up direct city-to-city, people-to-people commitments to building peace. If you can build a backdrop of peace you then have the foundations for real prosperity.
With peace you can also start taking a real look at cultural and religious differences.
Globalisation of the world economy means trading cities such as Christchurch have to reach out into the world economy and be prepared to map out our own way.
Direct city-to-city economic ties are faster and more effective in the age of the internet than the old ways of waiting for central government to call all the shots.
As a frequent roving trade ambassador for Christchurch, I can assure you that all the cities of the world are facing much the same issues.
Part of our challenge as good global citizens is to share our experiences and successes with our other cities, and in turn learn from them.
Nobody values peace quite as highly as those who have seen the alternative. Christchurch is recognised internationally as having had a significant role in the evolution of the peace movement. It is a role we can take on that allows us to make a positive impact out of all proportion to our size and population. By the end of this year I would like Christchurch to have thought through our international strategy. I hope that a major commitment to peace proves to be a central plank to that policy.
At Hiroshima I expect to again hear some of the harrowing tales of horror from the survivors of the dawn of the age of nuclear terror.
I’m proud to take a lead role in Mayors for Peace. I hope now that you understand at least some of why that is. Let us all try and give peace a chance.
Mayor of Christchurch
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