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Loading...Blind Leading The Blind: Canada Helps Monitor Ukrainian Election
This October, the Canadian government will send election monitors to Ukraine to ensure safe and fair voting.
The above is not a joke.
The Canadian government, made up of the Conservative Party of Canada, which is facing challenges in eight ridings and facing allegations in at least one more, is sending election monitors to ensure a fair election in another country.
The Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, Jason Kenney, made this announcement in Etobicoke–Lakeshore. Etobicoke–Lakeshore, which sits right beside Etobicoke Centre, the riding with results currently under scrutiny by the Supreme Court because of voting irregularities. Presumably the location for this announcement was chosen with a healthy dose of irony, as was the addition of Ted Opitz to the group of MPs announcing it. Opitz is the sitting MP for Etobicoke Centre, who won the riding by 26 votes and may have to face a by-election given the irregularities.
At the same time, the Conservative Party is fighting an attempt by the Council of Canadians to have the results in seven other ridings thrown out. The challenge comes as a result of phone calls purported to be from Elections Canada that told voters their polling stations had changed. Elections Canada reports they have received over 800 complaints about such calls, but the lawsuit was brought forth by just nine voters in seven ridings. A judge has already rejected a request for dismissal by the Conservative MPs representing those seven ridings.
The Council of Canadians says the phone calls show an effort to suppress the vote in the May 2 election. In a press release, they declared that the suit has nothing to do with whether the Conservative Party or any of their officials were involved in the voter suppression. The Council claims only that there was an attempt to suppress the vote, which calls into question the results. As the lawsuit moves through the courts, Elections Canada is conducting their own investigation into the calls.
In fact no specific allegation of wrongdoing has been made by the applicants against the candidates or anyone else in the Conservative Part. The job of sorting out who may have been responsible for such illegal activity belongs to the Commissioner of Canada Elections. The applications, on the other hand, are about restoring the democratic rights of voters taken from them by subterfuge.
Meanwhile, two Conservative MPs have been confronted with allegations of fundraising issues. Dean Del Mastro is facing an investigation into his campaign expenses and fundraising while Paul Calandra and Peter Penashue have both had to respond to questions about their fundraising this summer as well.
With questions about who was allowed to vote in Etobicoke Centre and how many times, who was impersonating Elections Canada on the phone across the country and who certain MPs have taken money from, does Ukraine really want help from Canada?
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Read more: canada, elections, fair elections, politics
Photo Credit: JMacPherson
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12 comments
+ add your ownI love how the conservatives on here can just ignore tens of thousands of reports of voter suppression in our own country.
I guess you guys just don't care about the democratic process.
It's disgusting.
It shouldn't matter if you're liberal or conservative..
We should all care about having fair elections.
What is happening to this country?!
You're making fools out of all of us on the world stage.
This country will never get the respect it once had back.
Oh this is terrible!
Our government committed electoral fraud in our last election by using voter suppression through robocalls.
How can we be monitoring an election after that?!
@Steve R.
Keep throwing your petty insults at us.
You're only showing your true colors.
I'm not going to sink to your level.
The usual attempted character assassination against the democratically-chosen victor! The so-called "Council of Canadians" couldn't let Elections Canada proceed with due process; they had to go make a big splashy statement of their own... as if they had any moral high ground to do it from.
Meanwhile, Stephen Harper continues to govern as the best political leaders Canada has for the economic realities we all face in this world.
Steve R., well-spoken! You should be in receipt of a Green Star about now.
We aren't a dictatorship ffs, what's with the title.
I'd claim to be surprised, but you all know it'd be a lie.
Canada monitoring elections for honesty??? WTF?
Why should ANY country be sending people to scrutinize elections in another country? Do we ask the Ukie government, or any other, to watch over our elections? It's all a joke anyway.
I hope the Ukraine relies on more than the Canadian delegation to watch the vote-counting..
It's only the "blind leading the blind" if you're a bleeding heart liberal that doesn't know how to be conservative!
It never ceases to amaze me - liberals do a shitty job of running the country, and when the voters throw them out, they claim the election was rigged, and get all bent out of shape like they've been sorely wronged!
I guess when you have so many of your countrymen on welfare, dependent on the government for everything, you don't expect to be booted out of power, right? Well - welcome to reality. Even some of the welfare recipients don't like the job you do!
You don't have some kind of "right" to be in power - you have to earn it - and you don't earn it by spending taxpayer money like there's no tomorrow.
Oh - and don't ONLY highlight the alleged transgressions of your opponents - fess up to some of your own as well, why don't you? Liberal politicians are every bit as corrupt as conservative politicians, if not more so!
And those that won't admit it - really ARE the "blind leading the blind"!
They may learn how an election should be run and so an improvement for the Canadian people when they return!
People often want to control what other people do, since they are so screwed up themselves.
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