Natasha Fyles' 18 months as Northern Territory chief minister, and her tenure in government, has been marked by notable highs and lows.
During the pandemic peak she performed as one of Australia's most capable health ministers.
Over the past month, after a series of revelations about her personal shareholdings and perceived conflicts of interest, her grasp on leadership slipped.
But even before the faced these issues, the shine was starting to come off her government.
From PE teacher to chief minister
Fyles started her political career as a self-effacing young mum.
The former PE teacher was elected to NT Parliament in Nightcliff — one of Darwin's most left-leaning, green-minded seats — in 2012, replacing the sitting Labor member.
She proved herself a capable politician as opposition health spokeswoman against the Giles Government.
Alcohol policy dominated her political career
When Michael Gunner's Labor took power in the 2016 landslide win, she took the difficult portfolio of alcohol policy.
Moves like reinstating the banned drinker register to stop problem drinkers buying alcohol were well received.
But community anger about the crime spike caused by allowing remote alcohol bans to lapse in July last year wasn't quelled by the last-minute move to reinstate them.
Her attempt to blame the former Coalition federal government for not keeping those bans in place fell flat.
"What is frustrating about the previous Coalition government ... is that alcohol plans were developed by community and they sat on the shelf of ministers in Canberra's desks," she said in January.
"So we are urgently going to pull together an alcohol management plan for the whole of Central Australia."
Steering the territory through the pandemic
When COVID hit Australia in 2020, Fyles stepped up as one of Australia's most capable health ministers, responding quickly to Indigenous community worries by closing borders and limiting deaths.
She also opened Australia's national pandemic quarantine centre in Howard Springs.
Defending her decision to reopen NT borders under sustained criticism from Indigenous health organisations in February last year, she said:
"We kept COVID out of the territory for a significant period until vaccination was available, and until that vaccination was able to be widespread across the territory, and we are continuing to respond to the needs of each and every community."
Despite another confident election win in 2020, Labor's shine with voters was fading.
When chief minister Michael Gunner ran out of steam and resigned in July last year, Fyles didn't appear keen to replace him when asked at a press conference if she'd hoped to take the top job.
Her decision to green-light controversial gas fracking in the Beetaloo Basin in May took off skin with the public, and within her Left faction of Labor.
She has also been on the ropes unable to curb rising crime, and forcing NT police commissioner Jamie Chalker to resign in April didn't help her sell the message her government was making moves to take control.
The fact that the crime crisis in Alice Springs forced the Prime Minister to fly in in January to commit $250 million to tackling it served to underline Labor's local failures.
But it has been her support for gas and mining while being accused of conflicts of interests, which she denies, that started her undoing.
She strongly pushed to secure — and has vociferously defended — the potential of $3.5 billion in federal funding for a new hub on Darwin Harbour's Middle Arm to export the Beetaloo gas, which is currently the subject of a Senate inquiry.
In June, she again repeated her defence of the project.
"Middle Arm will be a sustainable precinct for both jobs here in the territory for manufacturing, but also around making sure that we can utilise new technologies and provide energy not only to the Northern Territory but around Australia and the world," she said.
"When people try to write this off, that this is fossil fuel companies, you can do that, you can grab your headline, but this is also backed by CSIRO."
She was still defending it when she led an address to the National Press Club with an attack on "southerners" and "teals and trolls" for "spreading their nonsense" about the NT's gas projects.
Then last month she was forced to sell 169 shares in Woodside after first explaining they were a gift from her grandmother.
Loading..."I have always declared share holdings while a Member of Parliament, in accordance with the legislation," she said at the time.
"I have never had any dealings with Woodside as chief minister.
"I will not let this be a distraction from the real issues facing the territory, or let it be used by the territory's opponents to try and stop us from building the territory's future," she said.
Last week it emerged her political adviser Gerard Richardson was a lobbyist for Beetaloo gas company Tamboran.
Rejecting calls for health investigations into mining dust coating Groote Eylandt while holding 754 undisclosed shares for the South32 mine owner gave her the final push.
If you had asked any Territorian in the street a few weeks ago what the chief minister might have to resign over, crime would have been the likely answer.
Instead, it was the resources projects the Labor Government is still hoping will underpin a more prosperous future for the territory that saw her ultimate downfall.
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2023-12-19 07:33:15Z
CBMiaGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmFiYy5uZXQuYXUvbmV3cy8yMDIzLTEyLTE5L25vcnRoZXJuLXRlcnJpdG9yeS1jaGllZi1taW5pc3Rlci1uYXRhc2hhLWZ5bGVzLWhpc3RvcnkvMTAzMjQ2Mzk20gEoaHR0cHM6Ly9hbXAuYWJjLm5ldC5hdS9hcnRpY2xlLzEwMzI0NjM5Ng
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