[ekimekim]

This kind of result is perfectly valid. If candidates A and B are polarising, and candidate C is a compromise candidate, and you have a preferential voting system, then it makes sense that many people would put A or B first, and C second, producing a victory for C despite almost zero of the primary vote.

Of course, realistically, what probably happened in this case was more to do with party preferences and backroom deals, because you can give the voters an awesome voting system but then they'll just turn around and ask someone else to tell them what preferences to give anyway...