Once again, the Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta has been successful in eroding democracy without provoking even ripples of concern among the vast majority of the Albertan population.
The March 2008 election was the most chaotic and ill-managed election in recent Canadian history. Up to twenty-five percent of the voting population were left off voting lists and had to be sworn in at the ballot stations. The Elections Alberta website also crashed on voting day so that those who did not receive voting cards had to search their neighbourhood to find their ballot station, often to find it was the wrong one. This fiasco resulted in a dismal 41 per cent voter turnout among registered voters, meaning that it is possible that as few as 30 per cent of eligible Albertans granted the Ed Stelmach government an “overwhelming” mandate to govern.
As a result of the election fiasco, Lorne Gibson, Alberta’s chief electoral officer, put forward numerous suggestions of how to improve Alberta’s creaky electoral system. Suggestions included having returning officers, people who oversee elections, be selected on a non-partisan basis and not from within the membership of the Progressive Conservative Party. Another suggestion was to give the chief electoral officer the power to prosecute offences of the Election Act such as violations of campaign finance. Currently, the power to prosecute rests with the Alberta department of justice, which is headed by Allison Redford, a PC MLA. This is important because nineteen campaign finance violations were reported in the 2008 election and the Alberta Department of Justice has failed to act on even one.
These suggestions where by no means “radical” and would be expected in any liberal democracy; it’s important to note that not one of Gibson’s one hundred recommendations has been acted upon.
However, Gibson, for his work was essentially fired last week when an “all-parties” committee decided not to renew his contract by an eight to three vote. I have placed “all-parties” in quotations because while the committee contains members of all the parties represented in the Alberta legislature, the eight votes not to renew Gibson’s contract came from the eight PC members on the committee while the three dissenting votes came from the opposition members.
The Progressive Conservatives have claimed that Gibson’s contract was due to expire and he was not offered a new one because of the calamity of the March 2008 election. However, while Gibson was responsible for the election, he claims he duties were restricted because he required returning officers to conduct proper enumeration. As mentioned above, these returning officers are appointed by within the structure of the PC party. These returning officers were not appointed in time for Gibson’s office to do the work, which led to the disorganized election.
Gibson claims his dismissal was politically motivated, and it’s tough to argue against such a claim, since it was only weeks ago that he released his critical report on the election. But this act sends deep chills into the spines of Albertans who care about democracy and care about keeping the “government” separate from the party that governs. Many positions in our government are independent positions and act on behalf of democracy and Albertans as a whole. This is to prevent the kind of situations found in dictatorial regimes where the governing party does as they wish without any barriers. Gibson’s position held one of those positions and this action sends a dangerous message to other independent legislative officials such as the auditor general, ethics commissioner and ombudsmen, who may hesitate next time they have something critical to say of the government.
This is just one many cases where the PCs have been successful at eroding democracy. With a party that has governed the province for over forty years, it is becoming increasingly difficult to view the difference between the Progressive Conservative Party and the government as a whole. Yet stories like this barely make a wave among Albertans and these incremental steps at eroding democracy fail to make the majority of the Albertan populace to even reflect on the state of democracy in this province. Perhaps this will just become another sad story in Alberta’s history of apathy and political disengagement.
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