It must be said: New Zealand never breaks, not even on a graphic level. The failure of the referendum to introduce the new national flag shows that links with the past still make sense to most New Zealanders. The official results announced in these hours attribute an 56% of preferences for the current flag and an 43% for the Silver Fern, new proposed drape, which instead ofUnion Jack shows a native fern of the island (already present on the meshes of the All Blacks).
When we talk about ties with the past for New Zealand, we obviously mean the close relationship with the United Kingdom. To be honest, whatever the outcome of the consultation, nothing would have changed neither in the substance of the political relations, nor in the didactic profile: if today it is difficult to draw the New Zealand banner, in case it had won the Silver Fern it would have been more or less the same ...
The variation, apparently purely symbolic, actually had a vague geopolitical value. For the first time in history, Auckland had decided to take its own path by cutting the umbilical cord with London only symbolically.
The flag of Great Britain is graphically formed by the crosses of the three constitutive nations: the English one of Saint George; the Scottish one is Saint Andrew; the Irish one of St. Patrick (Wales is considered as merged with England). Its presence on the flags of other countries highlights the effective link between London and the Commonwealth Realm, of which 15 nations are still part of the world and of which Queen Elizabeth is formally Head of State. However, only 3 of these countries still carry it today in a canton of their own flag: Australia, the Tuvalu archipelago and New Zealand. To these are added the Fiji Islands, which despite becoming a republic in the 1987 have never updated their national flag. 
Beyond the gems and curiosities, belonging to the Commonwealth realm still entails a constitutional dependence with the Great Breatagna. Three important nations of the planet, such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand have a bond with the United Kingdom which is then transformed on the political level: the same choices, the same alliances, the same wars. It is no coincidence that the refusal of the new banner seems to have weighed the RSA, the New Zealand war veterans association, determined to defend the flag under which they fought. Evidently "old flag, honor of captain" is not just a proverb.
In this way the example of Canada was not followed, which was conditioned by the secessionist thrusts of the French-speaking Quebec, in the 1965 it closed with theUnion Jack to adopt the maple leaf.
It is therefore to be imagined that the choice of graphic continuity will not be followed by claims of republican independence with a lot of New Zealand greetings to the Queen of England. In Australia, vice versa, where nobody has actually proposed to change the flag, the debate on the declaration of the republic is always very current.
Whether conservative choices or flag changes, what seems certain is the solidity of the anglofilia of the former British colonies, supported by linguistic, cultural and at this point also sentimental continuity.
That, on the British Empire, the curtain of history has instead decided to close every window, unfortunately for London an irredeemable certainty appears. There are no flags on this, but it is all another matter ...
(photo: web)
