The howls of outrage that greeted the possibility of a Canadian hand in the ownership of Auckland Airport have been curiously silent on the prospect of the airport making its own overseas investment.The idea of a Canadian fund buying a stake in the airpor
The howls of outrage that greeted the possibility of a Canadian hand in the ownership of Auckland Airport have been curiously silent on the prospect of the airport making its own overseas investment.
The idea of a Canadian fund buying a stake in the airport in 2008 was seen as so morally repugnant, action was required at the highest possible level of government to stop it.
Less than two years later, and that nationalism doesn’t seem to matter when it’s New Zealand doing the invading.
Auckland Airport has sealed the deal on buying a 24.55% stake in two North Queensland airports and has gone to shareholders to raise $126 million to help fund the purchase.
The capital raising has already received the thumbs-up from its cornerstone council shareholders, the same councils who blew their tops over the possibility of Canadian pensioners owning a slice of the international terminal.
But while that bid was apparently a threat to the entire kiwi way of life, nobody seems to mind if some of the assets the Auckland airport will now own are based overseas.
This may be symptomatic of the kind of anti-Canadian prejudice seen in beady-eyed and flapping headed Canadians in the South park cartoon, or might just be another sign of the human need to jealously guard its own standing, while happily cutting into others.
