Harper fights to hold power after 10 years
Liberal challenge looms as Canada goes to polls.
Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s nearly 10 years in power could end this week, along with his dream of shattering Canada’s image as a liberal bastion.
Harper, one of the longest-serving Western leaders, is seeking a rare fourth term in Monday’s election but polls show him narrowly trailing Liberal leader Justin Trudeau, the son of late Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, one of Canada’s most charismatic politicians.
A Trudeau victory could ease Canada’s tensions with the administration of President Barack Obama, whose reluctance to approve the Keystone XL pipeline has damaged ties between the two major trading partners. The Alberta-to-Texas pipeline is important to Canada, which needs infrastructure to export its growing oil sands production.
Trudeau supports the project but it’s not a do-ordie issue like it is for Harper, who represents a district in oil-rich Alberta. The Liberal candidate said last week repairing relations will be a top priority.
“The relationship between Canada and the United States, that has been so soured over the past 10 years between our prime minister and President Obama especially, is much larger than just the Keystone XL pipeline,” Trudeau said. “That has actually been a point of frustration for the Americans that I’ve spoken with, that all this government wants to talk about is a single pipeline project.”
Harper has done what many thought impossible since coming to power in 2006: He won three consecutive elections and nudged a traditionally center-left country to the right. He gradually lowered sales and corporate taxes, avoided climate change legislation, supported the oil industry against environmentalists and backed Israel’s rightwing government. He has put a more conservative face on the nation of 35 million, de-emphasizing health care and multiculturalism as the things that make Canadians proud.
For Harper, a loss to the Liberals would be personally devastating. Former colleagues say his long-term goal is nothing short of redefining what it means to be Canadian, killing the long-held notion that the Liberals — the party of long-time leaders Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chretien — are Canada’s natural party.
“His whole being is about destroying the Liberals,” said Robert Bothwell, a Canadian history professor at the University of Toronto. “If Justin beats Harper, Harper will just go through the roof or maybe he’ll melt like the Wicked Witch of the West.”
The Liberals lead the Conservatives by almost 6 percentage points. According to the CTV/ Globe and Mail/Nanos Nightly Tracking Poll, the Liberals are at 36.5 percent, followed by the Conservatives at 30.6 percent. The New Democrats, a leftist party that moved to the center in a bid to get elected for the first time, are at 23.5 percent. The margin of error for the survey of 1,200 respondents is 2.8 percentage points.
A minority government in the 338-seat Parliament appears likely, no matter which party wins the most seats. That would mean the winning party would have a shaky hold on power and need to rely on another party to pass legislation. Harper has said he’ll step down as Conservative leader if his party loses.