Canada: PM Calls Snap Elections
After weeks of bickering with opposition parties in Parliament, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced today that new elections for Parliament would be organized ASAP.
General elections are likely to take place October 14, after ‘Canada’s governor-general announced the dissolution of the parliament.’
“Between now and October 14th, Canadians will choose a government to look out for their interest in a time of global economic trouble,” Harper said.
“They will choose between clear direction or uncertainty, between common sense or risky experiments, between steadiness or recklessness.”
The conservative Harper - who has been on the head of his country’s longest ruling minority government - ‘insisted in recent weeks that new elections will be necessary to deal with the specter of possible recession, as the manufacturing sectors in the most populous provinces, Ontario and Quebec, suffer a direct hit from the global economic slowdown.’
Harper’s timing is nearly perfect; according to experts, conservatives have a good chance of becoming the majority after the elections.
Gilles Duceppe of the independent Bloc Quebecois ‘warned’ earlier this week that Harper’s dream may come true: “Mr. Harper wants a majority government and he is not kidding. A majority is within reach,” he said.
Stephane Dion, leader of the main opposition party the Liberal Party, also criticized the Prime Minister. “He does not want Canadians to have the time to notice that he is ill-prepared to cope with the economic situation,” Dion said about Harper.
Harper himself disagreed saying, “This government will continue to lead Canada by keeping taxes down and keeping the budget in surplus and limiting spending to clear and affordable objectives. The opposition insists on large-scale spending and a new tax.”
Although the opposition may not be happy with it, Harper is quite a popular Prime Minister - for someone heading a minority government that is. He has done a great deal for Canada since 2006, and he has, for the first time in quite a long while, been able to show Canadians that conservative government can work.
From the looks of it Canadian voters may very well reward Harper for his work in the last two years. It is not often that they see a conservative who is actually able to govern effectively.
