Maybe now the Liberal Party, political observers and the mainstream media will finally stop under-estimating our softly-spoken Premier Jay Weatherill.
Today he has secured the next four years of Labor – and perhaps another four after that – after wooing senior Liberal Martin Hamilton-Smith.
The truth is that South Australia doesn’t understand the kind of man that leads it.
Weatherill has been chronically under-estimated by his enemies – including those within his own party – and his achievement in leading the party to an extraordinary fourth term has been glossed over in breathtaking fashion.
Faced with the slenderest of margins post-election, he blindsided Liberal leader Steven Marshall by travelling to Port Pirie to secure independent Geoff Brock’s support for a Labor government.
Today he has driven a stake into the heart of the South Australian Liberal Party and set his political legacy in stone.
Barring an unforeseen political earthquake, Weatherill will lead Labor to the 2018 state election.
He will be exceedingly difficult to dislodge, particularly given the turmoil ahead of the Liberals following today’s stunning defection.
The softly-spoken Left-winger has always flown beneath the radar; a stealth bomber of a political operator who maneuvered his way to the top of the party despite being from the minority faction.
Only a handful of hard-headed political operatives in both major parties have fully accepted the truth – Weatherill is one of the shrewdest South Australian politicians in recent history, arguably the equal of Mike Rann at his absolute best.
Even Rann wouldn’t have dreamed of pulling off a gambit of today’s magnitude – arguably one of the most stunning political plays in South Australian history.
In retrospect we shouldn’t be surprised.
He managed to win the unwinnable election. And unlike Rann, he pulled off his victory in the face of a united Opposition and with the budget and economy crumbling around him.
Today confirms him as a supreme political operator.
No-one will misjudge him again.
