Flag Proposals: Niue

The Pacific island of Niue is a self-governing state freely associated with New Zealand, which takes responsibility for its foreign relations and defense. Before this, it was briefly a British protectorate and subsequently a dependent territory of New Zealand.

Niue’s flag is a British yellow ensign with – unusually – the canton rather than the fly defaced. The color stands for the Niuean sunshine and the warm friendship between Niue and New Zealand. The four smaller stars represent the Southern Cross, as on the New Zealand flag; the larger star symbolizes “the self-governing status of Niue, standing alone within the deep blue sea”.*

Since neither Niue nor New Zealand is any longer under British dominion, I believe the continued use of a British-style colonial ensign is symbolically inappropriate. A conversation with a colleague yielded this proposed design instead:

This is a fairly straightforward simplification of the existing flag. It omits the anachronistic Union Jack while retaining the yellow field for sunshine and warm feelings, the Southern Cross as a tribute to New Zealand, and Niue’s single star on a disc of ocean blue.