CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
In her first real headline since she made those very nasty comments we won’t talk about, the Queensland’s Opposition Leader has called on the Premier to override the advice of the state’s Chief Health Officer and allow people from COVID-19 hotspots to bypass quarantine and attend funerals.
Earlier today, our state’s LNP announced a plan in which people could visit the terminally ill and attend funerals while “wearing PPE and [under] strict requirements not to mix in the community”.
Despite a concerted effort by the Murdoch media to eradicate every non Liberal Party-aligned government from the planet, the Leader of the LNP has struggled to compete with the media coverage given to the Premier through her daily COVID-19 press conferences.
However the LNP leader’s most recent comments, which appear to be a failed attempt to keep pushing the Prime Minister’s funeral/border hot button from at least five news cycles ago, have left many Australians asking the question:
Who is Annastacia Palaszczuk up against?
With the state election taking place in only 45 days, The Betoota Advocate has made the executive decision to officially profile the Queensland opposition leader, Dianne Freckleham.
Unless you hate yourself enough to pay to read what is behind the NewsCorp paywall, you might not even know her name.
You certainly wouldn’t know that the 2020 Queensland election is the first time the major parties have gone head to head with two female leaders.
In fact, it is also the first time the Queensland LNP have even had a female leader.
Enter Dianne Freckleham.
Raised on a taro plantation just outside of Ingham, the Virgo mother of eight says her love of the land and agriculture plays a big part in her political ideologies.
According to her biographer John Birmingham, Freckleham reportedly gave up a promising career in adventure tourism after witnessing a bungee cable snap during her Gap Year in New Zealand’s Lake Taupo. Opting to return back to FNQ where she found work selling essential oils at the Cairns Esplanade Markets.
By her 19th birthday she had already married her husband Tyrone Stefanovic – a second cousin of the Queensland media identities Karl and Peter – and was pregnant with their triplet firstborn sons: Keegan, Brucey and Darren.
After making a name for herself as the President of the North Queensland branch of the Young Greens, Freckleham quickly transitioned towards the conservative side of politics in her early 20s, after taking issue with some of the ‘off-colour’ jokes in a Channel 10 re-run of Priscilla Queen Of The Desert.
It was during a 2010 pilgrimage to the hometown of her political idol Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen that Dianne and Tyrone decided to set up shop in the South Burnett region – where she later became the state member.
While Tyrone works from home as graphic designer, their eight children are well known in the community as the only kids in Kingaroy to ever play soccer.
Dianne Freckleham is also the first practicing Muslim to lead any party major party to an election in Australian history.
Queensland’s 2020 general election voting period is from Monday 19 October to election day, Saturday 31 October.
