GLEN CLARK and MOE SIHOTA BACK

Underbelly News
Downtown Eastside

Hi All!

Sources confirm that Glen Clark and Moe Sihota were busy working the room at the NDP Van-Kingsway nomination meeting on Sunday afternoon. In fact, Mr Clark was there to nominate his favoured candidate Adrian Dix.

However, it appears that Mr Clark and Mr Sihota have less star appeal with the grassroots than they may have once enjoyed. In an interesting twist, Mr Dix received 330 votes on the first ballot but lost seventy-five votes by the time the second ballot rolled around.. His main competitor Alicia Barsallo, gained 60 votes by the second ballot. This was not enough to win as Mr Dix beat out Ms Barsallo by 29 votes. Interesting is than an Indo Canadian candidate Shavinder Parmar who placed third on the first ballot, dropped off the second ballot, even though he didn't need to in order to throw his support behind Ms Barsallo. A fourth candidate Roberto Rous did not direct his votes.

I write this post of the Van-Kingsway nomination to point out a number of things. One is to always believe in yourself and stand up for what you believe in. Never waver and never fear because in the end the people will make the right choice. And always stand up to those power boys.

In the situation of Van-Kingsway, the members did speak. Three minority candidates (NDP members) received over 60 percent of the votes cast. This means that over 60 percent of the membership didn't vote for Mr Dix.

Yet, as posted earlier, the provincial executive had ruthlessly taken over running the nomination meeting. It appears they feared their chosen one, Mr Dix, who was heavily backed by Union leaders was about to suffer defeat and at all costs, the provincial executive, needed to prevent this from happening..

In the end, democracy lost and the NDP demonstrated once again that it hasn't grasped the concept of practising democracy. Then again, perhaps, this nomination meeting is a testament to the type of politics Glen Clark and Moe Sihota practise and believe in.

Jamie Lee Hamilton
tricia_foxx@yahoo.com