Separatism may have had its day
Viewpoint: Kamloops Daily News
Parti Quebecois leader Pauline Marois was shocked last week at the resignation of three top members of the Quebec National Assembly from her party.
The blow was enhanced last Tuesday when a fourth member, of lesser stature, joined the ranks of the mutineers.
Considering how badly the PQ’s sister party, the Bloc Québécois, was beaten in the May 2 federal election, having a trio — nay, a quartet — of top talent abandon the separatist ship to sit as independents is a heavy blow for sovereignty.
It was just six weeks ago that Quebecers turned en masse from the blowhard Bloc to the jovial Jack Layton. The combination of blows to the federal and provincial arms of the separatist movement suggests the movement’s demise is close at hand. We aren’t that optimistic, but it’s a warm and fuzzy thought.
At this point, the PQ is no longer a force to be reckoned with on the provincial front, just as the Bloc is no longer a force for separatism on the national front.
We say most Canadians welcome that news. We’d love to see Quebec separatism redefined as just another failed social experiment — birthed by dreamers, weaned by idealists and propagated by the truly delusional.
Meanwhile, Marois is flummoxed. And like any leader who doesn’t know what to do or say, she threw out the usual clichés: “We’ll roll up our sleeves, spit in our hands and get back to work.”
In that, Marois said nothing specific, nothing that can be tracked, traced or proven, nothing that can ever be defined as success or failure. Get back to work accomplishing what? Just what are the remnants of the frayed and fragmented PQ to do?
We have no idea, but Marois and what’s left of her supporters are going to work hard to ... well, fill in the blank and erase it later.
The movement is drowning and Marois is treading water in a whirlpool.
We expect that over the next week or so, Marois will visit the well and come up dry. If her desperate followers continue to wear their wool tuques over their eyes, she could continue as leader.
Otherwise, she’ll be out of a job soon enough.
We say the sooner the better.