Faruqi was a recently defeated contender in the Greens' top job vote, The Age has reported. Writing in an opinion column, state political editor Michael McGowan argues that the most shocking aspect of the contest has been overlooked.
To explain why, McGowan reaches back almost 10 years to the day Faruqi sat on the balcony of the Federal Hotel in Bellingen as results of a divisive party preselection rolled in. Faruqi had just defeated Lee Rhiannon, described by McGowan as the hard-left warrior who is perhaps the most significant, and controversial, Greens MP in NSW history.
On the day of that vote, Faruqi was with Jeremy Buckingham, then a Greens NSW upper house MP, along with a small group of other party members. Buckingham, a notable "Tree Tory" (the pejorative term for the right, or more environmental, faction of the Greens), had long been at war with the Eastern Bloc, or "Watermelon" (green on the outside, red on the inside) faction, which Rhiannon led along with David Shoebridge.
The column's case about what the leadership vote really means is built on that history.