SNAKING TOWARDS AN ELECTION

Anybody for a Prolonged Military Coup?...Dodging a Killer Duck ...Face to Face With Nigel Adlam... The Shock Emergence of Freak Power... Noisily Sipping Cafe Latte in the Mall ... Snuggling Up to Assorted Snakes ... What Next for the Good Ole Boys ?... Billion Dollar Marina Sinks ... Yet Another Health Department Snafu...Surprise Arrival of an American warship

As our spaced- out , soy milk latte sipping gonzo reporter hurried towards the Smith Street Mall today to witness Alison Anderson continue her reshaping of NT politics, he nearly walked into that whopping great amphibious duck which takes people on cruises with crocodiles.

Safely making it into the Mall without another unnerving encounter with a monster mechanical mallard , our man was startled to see a strange person draped in a python smiling at him. Jeezus !!! Hunter S. Thompson’s Freak Power Party ,intent on seizing control of the German owned Aspen-like snowfields of Tennant Creek, had obviously come to town.On closer examination, the snake charmer, probably some poor Indian student who had been fleeced by a shonky Australian education centre , was offering tourists the rare opportunity to “snuggle up to a snake.” This could be a winning election slogan for a dynamic political party.

Despite the strong competition from Sabu the elephant and snake man , Anderson was enthusiastic and had received a mountain of mainly supporting messages , something like 63 in one hour . Furthermore , she had marched into the lion’s den-the NT News- the day before and had a forthright conversation with the manager . She's a no nonsense lady.

As she was ushered into the newspaper's editorial section , tastefully decorated with stuffed crocodiles ,the embalmed bodies of bug- eyed creatures from outer space , multi- coloured g-strings and a large picture of Chairman Rupert, chief reporter Nigel Adlam was spotted. The two greeted each other politely, despite Adlam's opinion piece which had offended Anderson and caused her split with Hendo.

The manager of the News is a an old newspaper hand who was ejected from Fiji by the military junta. It is not known if the executive broke out kava and offered her a sip to get them into a relaxed frame of mind. However, she expressed herself strongly and calmly, said she did not mind criticism as long as it was reasonable and balanced. She may have even likened her present position , being under attack by the NT Government , to that of the newspaper man who got the one way ticket out of town for trying to tell the truth in Fiji.

In between dribbling latte down his front today , this furtive reporter noticed an odd bevy of other political animals in the Mall. There was backslapping, hand shaking Peter Murphy who writes familiar opinion pieces for a Sunday newspaper. And was that the contrary view Sunday PR chap Scott Stirling sitting , sipping soda, soaking up the scene ?

Terry Mills then made an appearance and looked as if he was about to keep an appointment with a consultant herpetologist. Somebody mentioned that a proposed billion dollar marina at Townsville , in which a well heeled British lord and Shane Stone , a former NT Chief Minister, had become involved ,now seemed to be in limbo (shades of Arafura ). Truly , you never know what you are going to next see or hear when you venture into the Mall in a time of a political shoot out.

Before reluctantly departing the Mall, this coffee stained reporter, due for his heart and worm tablets, was shown a letter which made his blood pressure jump. It revealed yet another embarrassing situation at the Royal Darwin Hospital.If the present Health Minister ,Kon Vatskalis, is aware , he sure hasn't said anything about it in public. Perhaps the busy spin doctors and plastic surgeons are working on it right now .

Methinks Monday will be the start of a most interesting week .There is bound to be an outbreak of dirty tricks as the good ole boys fearfully contemplate the loss of sinecures . Was that jamming of the ABC TV report about the Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer a deliberate Chinese act or a technical fault- which went unnoticed by Darwin's sleepy media - an indication of what might happen in the NT during an election?