Ouellet fuming about party’s video
What was supposed to be a feel-good video depicting the Parti Québécois as a big, happy family has backfired, turning into a bitter attack by one leadership candidate against the party brass.
Martine Ouellet went on the offensive in media interviews Tuesday, saying the party “establishment” had deliberately kept her out of the video and is trying to muzzle her.
“I was very surprised to see this video was produced without my participation,” Ouellet told reporters in the National Assembly hallway. “I find it unfortunate.”
The 40-second video, timed to coincide with Tuesday’s resumption of work at the legislature, features a short introduction by interim leader Sylvain Gaudreault followed by quick cuts of individual MNAs saying their names.
It’s all set against a background of music and ends with a chorus of “nous sommes Parti Québécois.”
Ouellet is conspicuously missing from the video, which was recorded at a party caucus meeting in Gatineau two weeks ago.
While party officials said Ouellet chose not to participate, she told reporters she did not refuse.
“I asked them to explain the concept,” she said. “I did not get any. I asked if I could say, ‘I am an indépendantiste.’ They said it might be possible. But in the end it didn’t happen. They left me hanging.”
PQ officials rolled their eyes as Ouellet kept repeating her story. They noted she received the same memo as all the other caucus members but refused to play along.
Ouellet was not done, however. She also accused Gaudreault of revealing to La Presse details of a conversation he had with her in which he dressed her down for taking part in a news conference against the Energy East pipeline project alongside members of Québec solidaire.
“The interim leader wants to restrict my freedom of speech on certain issues,” she said.
Ouellet said she feels she has been targeted by the PQ establishment, which she believes favours Alexandre Cloutier as leader.
Gaudreault, however, told reporters: “I do not intend to respond to candidates who are in the midst of a leadership campaign.”
Meanwhile, leadership hopeful Jean-François Lisée continued to be haunted by a tweet he posted Friday linking Cloutier with Islamic activist Adil Charkaoui.
Lisée acknowledged for the first time Tuesday there is no evidence Charkaoui supports Cloutier.
“I will say no,” Lisée told a news conference. “Adil Charkaoui is not a member of the PQ. Alexandre (Cloutier) did not solicit his support.
“Alexandre does not know Adil Charkaoui, who is a detestable person.”
Lisée refused to apologize, however, and argued the issue may be more about semantics than anything else.
“I accept we don’t have the same concept of the definition of the word ‘support,’ ” he said. “In the context, perhaps it would have been preferable to say, ‘spoke well of.’”