General News
16 April, 2025
Bosnic leads in by-election
WITH the numbers still too close to call, shimmying for the position of Mareeba Shire councillor looks to be a nail-biter between candidates Mladen Bosnic and Alan Pedersen.
As of Monday morning, the Queensland Electoral Commission website showed no real change in the neck-to-neck race, with Mr Bosnic (pictured) leading with 4,017 votes, and Mr Pedersen closely following on 3,840 votes.
“The results so far are tight, I admit, but they were tight last time,” Mr Bosnic said. “
“And the number of votes have dwindled off. My fingers and toes are twisted from being crossed all week.”
He said he had done his best and campaigned hard and joked that he had a speech ready for a win and for a loss.
He praised the community for its efforts in the by-election, with the 10,426 votes cast so far a “pretty good result” considering only about 11,000 voted in the full local government election the previous year.
According to the QEC, the number of people enrolled to vote in the shire is 16,376.
And while the results were not clear as this article went to print (counting closed on Tuesday), Mr Bosnic feels vindicated in his objection to the by-election being held at all.
“I think the council underestimated the public there,” he said.
“Even now, while we’re in the midst of a Federal election, the issue has stayed in the public limelight, there’s been a lot of social media chatter.”
Mr Bosnic was the runner-up in the council election held in 2024, and with the passing of Cr Kevin Davies, the Local Government Act provided for two options to fill the vacant position – offering the position to the next candidate in line or holding a by-election.
Mr Bosnic was the next in line.
Much of the public reaction was against council’s decision to hold the by-election, claiming it was a waste of money which has been estimated to be in excess of $100,000.
“I don’t want to dwell on it, but my views haven’t changed, and I think the voters have spoken,” Mr Bosnic said.
Three other candidates Gaye Taylor (926 votes), Carol Chong (849 votes) and Robyn Drury (633 votes) are well behind Mr Bosnic and Mr Pedersen.
