Independent candidates soldier on in tough battles
Before he became a politician, Rick Strankman bolted from the agricultural industry and spent a week in jail for his troubles.
Now, having rejected a political home with the UCP to run as an Independent, the former Wildrose and UCP MLA admits he’s an underdog pitted against his former party’s machinery.
“It’s the same as going to jail — I didn’t have to, and I may get my butt handed to me now, but I’m giving Albertans direct democracy,” said Strankman, who was jailed in 2002 for protesting the Canadian Wheat Board’s monopoly.
Last January, Strankman bailed from the UCP after what he saw as the party’s betrayal of its vow to observe grassroots, bottom-up democracy.
On Friday, on his way to attend the opening of a John Deere dealership in Hanna, Strankman said he’s working hard to capitalize on mixed feelings for the UCP in the Drumheller-Stettler riding where’s he’s served two terms.
“Voters are saying they want the UCP, but they don’t trust Jason Kenney,” said Strankman.
But he says his name recognition only goes so far when so many people decide along party lines, and it frustrates him.
A few hundred kilometres to the southwest in the Cardston- Siksika riding, one of Strankman’s former UCP colleagues is also trying his luck as an Independent — but says he’s well in the running.
“I don’t usually run in a race if I don’t think I can win them,” said Ian Donovan, who was the Wildrose MLA for Little Bow from 2012 to 2015.
“I’m getting a lot of people who are tired of the hyper-partisan parties. People are very fed up.”
Donovan also said there’s a liberating feeling not being tied to issues in other parts of the province and having to defend a party’s actions he might not agree with.
Elections Alberta says so far 24 Independents are on the ballot for April 16.