David Shearer, a high-ranking United Nations official is the Labour Party's candidate in the by-election in the parliamentary seat of Mt Albert left vacant by Helen Clark who left to work in the United nations.
I am not a member of any political party, but I support the under dog, the poor working class. In my university days, I worked in factories in the long summer break. That has influenced my thinking.
With Shearer's CV, I know who I will vote on June 13. Shearer was standing outside my school entrance as I was going home. His supporter gave me his red flyer. I did a double take, and went back to take his photo. He was most obliging and thanked me. Of course he doesn't know that I am doing a post about him.
Shearer is an aid worker who has spent much of the past two decades in the world's worst war zones: Somalia, Rwanda, Liberia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Lebanon and now Iraq.
Herald files show a number of close calls, such as surviving an armed hold-up by bandits in Mogadishu to being on the ground in Belgrade while it was being bombed.
Mr Shearer and his wife, Anuschka Meyer, were the Herald's New Zealanders of the Year in 1992. That year, they ran one of the biggest aid camps in Somalia during the civil war.
He is currently the deputy special representative of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon in Iraq.
His role includes acting as envoy for the UN Development Programme - which Helen Clark has left Mt Albert to run.
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