Sanctus – Green Party leader, and Vice Chancellor, Josephine Chari-Jones declined to express confidence in embattled Chancellor Ethan Ringrose this evening, saying while it is “a matter for Ringrose”, the junior coalition partners would find it “difficult to continue serving with a Chancellor under police investigation”.
Chari-Jones’ comments come a day after the Sanctarian Federal Police said they would take over the investigation into the Chancellor’s election spending, with Green Party executives having spent the day in crisis talks about their next steps. Although she confirmed that they would not be pulling the plug on the coalition just yet, it is clear from her active declining to express confidence that barring any surprises, Sanctaria could be heading for an early general election.
The Vice Chancellor said this evening that “as a coalition partner, we have to hold ourselves and this government to a high standard. If our partners do not have those same standards, then we would find it quite difficult to continue serving with a Chancellor coming from those same partners, especially one under active police investigation”.
Ringrose, for his part, has not commented publicly on the investigation, nor has his personal or political offices. However some Democratic Left MPs, not necessarily aligned with Ringrose, have been leaking to journalists that they would rather throw their leader under the bus rather than go to an early election. Early dissolution of the House of Deputies is a power reserved to the President, though to date no President has refused a request to dissolve the House early; it has been mooted by these same MPs that they would privately lobby the President to reject any request from Ringrose, saying “a political request from a Chancellor who is under active police investigation is a very suspect request, no matter the innocence of the Chancellor”.
JOEY SESSIONS, Political Editor
