MILDURA Mayor Simon Clemence says he has put his own head on the chopping block following explosive allegations Member for Mildura Ali Cupper tried to manipulate last year’s vote for a new mayor.
Cr Clemence claims Ms Cupper was both “puppet master” and “king maker” during a meeting of a “deal” team of five Mildura councillors, including himself, to effectively determine last November’s mayoral election.
The Mayor said he was “gob-smacked” that Ms Cupper was not only at the meeting but effectively chaired the discussion.
Also at the meeting were proposed mayor-to-be Jason Modica, his foreshadowed deputy Anthony Cirillo, Mark Eckel and Helen Healy, he said.
Cr Clemence said he feared being complicit with a “minefield” and described Ms Cupper’s involvement while a State MP as “wholly inappropriate”.
“Clearly there’s a possibility, if not a probability, that this could be taken much further and if that happens then I’m as much in jeopardy as anyone else,” Cr Clemence said yesterday.
“I put my head on the chopping block, too,” he said.
Cr Clemence said he joined the “deal” team two years earlier along with Ms Cupper, who was then on council, along with other elected representatives Crs Modica, Cirillo and Eckel to determine the three-year cycle of mayors and deputy mayors.
That deal began with Mayor Cr Eckel with Cr Cupper his deputy, followed Cr Clemence with Cr Modica as deputy before Cr Modica was elevated to the top job with Cr Cirillo his deputy.
Cr Clemence said the plan was to effectively keep Cr Glenn Milne out of the mayoral chair and give Cr Cupper’s political ally Cr Modica the opportunity to be mayor going in to this month’s council elections.
He said that following concerns raised by Cr Greg Brown about the “deal”, he then conducted his own research and sought advice and was “concerned” by the result.
Cr Clemence said he then decided to abandon the “deal” and run for a second term as mayor which prompted an emergency meeting of the “deal” team.
“There was horror in the ‘deal’ team,” he said.
“The meeting was all about getting me to stay with the ‘deal’.”
Cr Clemence claimed that after he raised the financial impacts of him not taking the mayoral role, Ms Cupper offered him a job as her parliamentary advisor in front of other “deal” members.
“I saw her involvement in the mayoral and deputy mayoral selection whilst a State MP as wholly inappropriate,” he said.
“She should, in my view, have stepped away from Local Government interference, but was instead being the controller, puppet-master the king-maker.”
Cr Clemence subsequently garnered the numbers and defeated front-runner Cr Modica by five votes to four, while Cr Min Poole was voted in as deputy mayor ahead of Cr Cirillo and Cr Healy.
That’s when Cr Clemence said the relentless public and personal attacks on him began to the point, now, that he had had “a gutful”.
“As a result of that power-play I’ve then become the hated one, the pariah because I took a mayoral position that someone else was supposed to have,” he said.
“I’ve been under attack for 12 months so I wrote my version of what I believed was going on.
“I hadn’t pulled the trigger until now because the attacks on me have just become atrocious and I’ve just had a gutful … so roll the dice and see what happens.
“People have got the right to know why I have been the victim of all these blistering attacks and the machinations behind it and I’ve got a right to defend myself, what happens from hereon in I couldn’t care less.”
Cr Clemence said his comments should not be seen as an attack on the council or councillors, but “a back story that people have a right to know”.
“This story probably plays out all over the country every time there are councillors elected and mayoral elections coming up … I don’t think there is anything unique about this.
“I think that perhaps the sitting State Member involving herself once she had left council, I think that’s fairly unique.”
Ms Cupper was contacted for comment by Sunraysia Daily on Thursday but refused.
