Trying to be heard (2011 federal election St. Catharines debate)

Trying to be heard

• The Standard (St. Catharines)
• 20 Apr 2011
• GRANT LAFLECHE Standard Staff glafleche@stcatharinesstandard.ca

BOB TYMCZYSZYN Standard staff

St. Catharines candidates squared off in a debate Tuesday at St. Catharines Collegiate but Christian Heritage Party candidate David Bylsma spoke to a small group outside the auditorium.

Moments before the St. Catharines-Thorold Chamber of Commerce candidates debate was set to begin, David Bylsma stood at the front of the auditorium and shouted for the attention of crowd.

“Can I have your attention please,” Bylsma said. “My name is David Bylsma, and I am a candidate in the federal election in the riding of St. Catharines.”

Bylsma, a veteran of six election campaigns for the Christian Heritage party, was not permitted to take part in the debate. This, he said, was a travesty and an insult to the democratic process. Still, he wanted voters to know who he was and that they could come and speak to him about his platform.

Moments after Bylsma thanked the crowd for their time, another candidate barred from the debate — Communist Party candidate Saleh Waziruddin — also stood up.

Waziruddin said his exclusion from the debate was unfair and robbed voters of a chance to hear all perspectives on the issues.

“By way of applause who wants to be able to hear all viewpoints on the issues of this election?” he said, generating a loud applause from the crowd.

Chamber of Commerce representative Kithio Mwanzia explained that two years ago, the organization decided to change the rules around the debate. Only those candidates whose parties had won at least 2% of the vote in the previous election would be allowed to participate. Neither the Communist or Christian Heritage party reached that threshold in the 2008 election.

Bylsma and Waziruddin were allowed to set up tables outside the auditorium to speak to voters and hand out campaign materials.

Fringe candidates aren't afraid of long odds (2011 federal election St. Catharines riding)

 

Fringe candidates aren’t afraid of long odds

Two new candidates running in St. Catharines

• The Standard (St. Catharines)
• 16 Apr 2011
• GRANT LAFLECHE Standard Staff glafleche@stcatharinesstandard.ca

The odds are stacked against them. Every election, candidates from small parties run for office with little in the way of resources or name recognition behind them.

But that doesn’t stop them from running or doing what they can to challenge the candidates from the mainline parties.

“I think the really interesting ideas are out here on the fringe,” said David Bylsma, the Christian Heritage Party candidate running in the St. Catharines riding. “The Green Party started on the fringes, and now they are a serious political party. I think our day like that is coming.”

Bylsma is a veteran of six political campaigns for the unabashedly religious political party that claims it is the only party that “recognizes the clause in the preamble of our constitution that recognizes the ‘supremacy of God.’ May He truly have dominion in Canada from sea to sea.”

The 40-year-old St. Annes resident said part of the reason he is running is that the Conservative party isn’t really a conservative party.

“ They’ve really drifted away from being social conservatives,” the father of eight children said. “ But you at least thought they would be fiscal conservatives, but they have abandoned that, too.”

Running on a small government, pro-life and social justice platform, Bylsma is hoping voters who’ve had enough with politics in Ottawa will give his party a chance. He said he understands the CHP has a long shot at best of winning a seat in the House of Commons, but doesn’t think a vote for him is a wasted ballot.

Neither does Saleh Waziruddin, the St. Catharines riding candidate for the Communist Party of Canada “If voting for the Communist party is a waste, then so is voting for any of the losing parties, or even the winning party, because they don’t need your vote,” he said. “ Voting Communist sends the loudest message.”

Although it’s Waziruddin’s first campaign as a candidate, he is not without political experience. He was the campaign manager for 2008 St. Catharines Communist candidate Sam Hammond.

The 33-year-old call centre worker said he is running because he has had to watch too many people lose their jobs, particularly in manufacturing, while corporations get tax breaks and maximize their profits.

“We have to put an end to this reverse-Robin Hood government,” he said.

Waziruddin said he understands small parties like his face long odds, but he sees potential in a coalition of like-minded parties.

“ We could build a coalition of the left, all the parties on the left that could affect change,” he said.