After campaign of staying mum, NZ leader is now a mother
JACINDA ARDERN, New Zealand’s prime minister, became the second elected leader to give birth while in office yesterday, presenting her new baby daughter to the world in a social media post from her hospital bed.
“Welcome to our village wee one. Feeling very happy to have a healthy baby girl,” Ms Ardern, 37, said, announcing the news on her Facebook page and Instagram accounts with a photograph of herself, the baby and her partner, Clarke Gayford.
Ms Ardern follows in the footsteps of Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister of Pakistan, who gave birth to her daughter Bakhtawar during her first term in office in 1990. In a striking coincidence, Ms Bhutto and Ms Ardern’s newborn daughter now share a birthday of June 21.
The New Zealand Labour prime minister received tweets of congratulation from Bakhtawar as well as from a host of world leaders, including The- resa May. Jeremy Corbyn tweeted a photo of him and Ms Ardern together in April this year, alongside a caption with congratulations from the Labour Party in the UK. Ms Ardern’s connection to the UK Labour party goes back to 2005, when she worked as an adviser in Tony Blair’s cabinet.
Ms Ardern is no stranger to records, becoming New Zealand’s youngest prime minister at 37 when she took office in October last year. Ms Ardern, who refused to discuss plans for motherhood during the election campaign, waited until January to reveal on Facebook she was going to be “prime minister and a mum”.
Winston Peters, her deputy prime minister and leader of her coalition partners, will step into her role while she takes six weeks off for maternity leave.
Last year, the New Zealand parliament voted to extend maternity leave from 18 to 22 weeks, but the prime minister will miss out on the extra time off as the law only takes effect from July 1.