New Zealand
or Aotearoa: Maori `long daylight´
Country in the southwest Pacific Ocean, southeast of Australia,
comprising two main islands, North Island and South Island, and
other small islands.
Government
New Zealand is a constitutional monarchy. As in Britain, the constitution
is the gradual product of legislation, much of it passed by the
British Parliament in London. The governor general represents
the British monarch as formal head of state and appoints the prime
minister, who chooses the cabinet. All ministers are drawn from
and collectively responsible to the single- chamber legislature,
the House of Representatives. This has 99 members, including four
exclusively Maori constituencies, elected by universal suffrage
from single-member constituencies. It has a maximum life of three
years and is subject to dissolution within that period.
Following constitutional referendums 1992 and 1993, it was agreed
that from 1996 the size of the House would be increased to 120
and a semi-proportional voting system introduced.
History
New Zealand was occupied by the Polynesian Maori from about AD 850.
The Dutch explorer Abel Tasman reached it in 1642, sighting the
Southern Alps, but the Maori would not let him land. British influence
began with the voyages of Captain James Cook, who, in search of
the Southern Continent, explored the coasts in 1769-70, 1773,
and 1777.
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