In August, Ardern delayed the poll by a month as Auckland, with nearly a third of New Zealand’s 5 million people, was in lockdown due to a coronavirus resurgence. Ardern, who became the world’s youngest female leader in 2017, holds huge appeal after her decisive response to the pandemic and handling of last year’s shooting by a white supremacist at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand’s worst mass murder. New Zealand has fared much better than most countries during the pandemic, but the Auckland outbreak has driven the number of confirmed and probable cases to 1,767 as of Saturday, with fatalities having risen to 24.
