The black and the bush vote hand victory to NT Labor

The flattening of the Country Liberals in Saturday's Northern Territory election shows the power of the Indigenous vote.

The Northern Territory's new chief minister, Labor's Michael Gunner, speaks during his victory party in Darwin Source: AAP

In the Darwin humidity, posters plastered with Labor leader Michael Gunner’s face kept falling off the walls of the Waratah Club.

But it didn’t change the resounding reception when the real face of the Chief Minister-elect arrived to chants of his name last night.

It was about the only thing that went wrong for Labor in the Northern Territory after annihilating the sitting Country Liberals government to claim power.

Four years after abandoning Labor, the Northern Territory’s bush voters returned to the party and handed it victory.

Former Northern Territory chief minister Adam Giles speaks to the media as he concedes the Country Liberal Party government's defeat. Source: AAP

With more than half the vote counted, Labor has just over 33,00 votes on a two candidate preferred basis to the Country Liberals’ 25,000.

Country Liberals leader Adam Giles conceded defeat to Mr Gunner last night.

The controversial leader, the first Aboriginal person to lead a state or territory government in Australia, was brutally honest in analysing his defeat.

"Tonight, no doubt, is a landslide, it's a thumping,” he told a mournful Country Liberals gathering in Alice Springs.

Mr Giles' own political seat is in doubt. He trails by 21 votes in his seat of Braitling.

Almost every regional seat that swung so heartily to the Country Liberals at the previous election, came back to the embrace of Labor.

In the 2012 election, the seats of Arafura, Arnhem, Daly, Namatjira and Stuart fell to the Country Liberals with healthy swings.

“We stopped working and walking with Indigenous Territorians, remote Territorians and that was the clear message at the 2012 election,” Chief Minister-elect Mr Gunner told SBS News.

“I’ve spent four years listening and we’ve got to trust them and we’ve got to give them meaningful control back of their lives and we’ve got start transferring resources and decision-making back to remote Territorians.”

It’s a message that has clearly resonated with voters outside the Territory’s major centres of Darwin and Alice Springs.

In Arnhem, a truly unique political race saw four Indigenous candidates vying to win. After a swing of 30 per cent against Labor in 2012, Selena Uibo stormed home for Labor with more than 55 per cent of the vote.

It was a similar story in the electorate of Namatjira, with Labor bleeding votes in 2012 to hand a 23 per cent swing to the Country Liberals. Now, Labor’s Chansey Paech has a healthy 500 vote lead on the Country Liberals candidate.

In Stuart, Labor will rollick home. It’s leading by four votes to one with nearly half the votes counted.

Labor has a narrower lead in Arafura, with Lawrence Costa leading Francis Xavier Kurrupuwu by about 200 votes.

If there’s any silver lining for the Country Liberals, it is in Daly. Incumbent Gary Higgins is edging out Labor’s Anthony Venes but there are still nearly 3000 votes to count.

The Country Liberals stronghold of Katherine, never anything but a Country Liberals seat since its creation in 1987, has fallen to Timorese community worker Sandra Nelson.

It’s a disastrous result for the Country Liberals. A horror show. The party has come crashing down from its 2012 position of 16 out of 25 seats in the NT Parliament, to one certain seat and two more on the cards - 16 seats down to three or less.

The ABC is predicting there will be four independent candidates.

Incumbent Chief Minister Michael Gunner assumed office in 2016 and has focused his 2020 campaign on the global coronavirus pandemic. Source: AAP

Imagine a political map of the NT. Now, it’s now overwhelmingly red, with a few specks of blue around Darwin and Alice Springs.

The Country Liberals will essentially cease to be an effective opposition, even if it can combine with the expected number of four independents in Parliament.

Mr Gunner’s half-hour victory speech was peppered liberally with messages of hope.

“The Territory remains a land of opportunity and I am proof of that,” he told the Labor party faithful in Darwin last night.

“A boy born in Alice Springs, who grew up in public housing in Tennant Creek and now stands here as a chief minister of the Northern Territory.”

But there were some clear warnings from the Labor leader.

“I will fight Canberra if they come for our GST,” he said.

“We need that money for to deliver for all Territorians.”

But fewer fights seemed to plan in what has, at times, been a farcical NT Parliament.

“They [the Country Liberals] are not our enemies, they are Territorians and I will work with them,” Mr Gunner promised.

The result will also be a further uncomfortable reminder for Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull that voters who so easily flock to a party can also abandon it.

Of the eight state and territory governments in Australia, five now have a Labor premier or chief minister.

The Liberal state of Western Australia will have its next election in March.

Counting in the NT election will resume on Monday.