NDP leadership hopefuls both upbeat on chances

Meili, Wotherspoon track support but no third-party polls available

Both men competing in Saskatchewan’s NDP leadership race are cautiously confident in their chances of winning.

Ryan Meili and Trent Wotherspoon are claiming sizable support from the 12,800 members registered to vote for a leader.

Meili says he is happy with the number of members his camp has signed up.

“We are able to track over 4,000 that are either new or renewed that are identified as supporting us. That’s a really good start,” he said, adding they’ll be looking to identify more voters when the final list comes in this week.

Such support would put 30 per cent of the votes in Meili’s camp.

Wotherspoon says his camp is “beyond that” but did not provide any specific numbers.

“We’ve identified a larger number than that,” he said. “Not that much larger, but we’d be beyond that.”

He said he has sold a “couple thousand new memberships” and has been able to identify a “few thousand” in existing support.

It remains to be seen how close or far apart the two candidates are. No reliable third-party polling has been done on the race. And neither candidate is declaring victory at this point, cautioning there is still race left to run.

Financial disclosures to the end of 2017 show Meili had 597 people give his campaign less than $250, to Wotherspoon’s 353 people.

Overall Meili had 666 donors and $129,737.92 raised. Wotherspoon had 439 donors and $103,975.66 raised.

The party will elect either Meili or Wotherspoon to be its next leader at a convention in Regina on March 3. Wotherspoon has been the MLA for Regina Rosemont since 2007; Meili won his Saskatoon Meewasin seat in a byelection last year.

NDP provincial secretary and CEO John Tzupa says that, “For sure over half (of members) will be voting.”

The governing Saskatchewan Party, which tallies its memberships in a different way, reported adding 17,625 members during its five-and-a-half-month leadership race, which concluded Saturday. Of the 27,125 members eligible to vote, 17,159 cast a ballot.