Gendron blasts PQ on issue of sovereignty

QUEBEC The Parti Québécois is partly to blame for the lack of support for sovereignty, according to the province’s longest-serving legislature member, who believes his party has renounced its duty to promote independence.

François Gendron, 73, will retire from political life this fall after 42 years in the legislature — but not without a few parting shots directed at the media, his political rivals and his own party.

“The PQ has things to blame itself for,” says Gendron, who was first elected in 1976 under former PQ premier René Lévesque.

The politician says he has three words of advice for his party, which has thus far proved incapable of rallying the population to the sovereignist cause: “Go. Talk. Convince.”

Gendron, a former teacher, believes sovereignists have to return to the basics of political activism, and show Quebecers what they have to gain from independence.

His party, he believes, has failed in this scholarly duty. He notes that they haven’t produced a single substantial document on the benefits of sovereignty since the 1995 referendum.

When asked if he’s scared he’ll never see Quebec become its own country, he responds: “The answer is yes.”

The outspoken politician had nothing but good words for former Bloc Québécois leader Martine Ouellet, who stepped down from her party this month after losing a confidence vote. Ouellet, who was criticized at times for her laser-like focus on independence, is a woman “of conviction,” who wears the cause proudly and knows it inside and out, Gendron says.

In contrast, he has harsh words for the poll-leading provincial Coalition Avenir Québec, whose members he describes as “puppets” with no program, and Philippe Couillard’s Liberals, whose “billions” spent on advertising he says ought to provoke a “social crisis.”

Gendron also blames a highly individualistic culture and a lack of education among citizens for the decline of the independence movement and most other collective efforts.

Some of his harshest criticism was reserved for the media, which in his opinion is largely responsible for discrediting the noble role of elected politicians through endless commentary that “pollutes the airwaves.”

“We’re less credible than sex workers and used car salesmen,” he says.

Gendron, who will not seek reelection this fall, says that what he’ll miss the most is representing the 35,000 people in his western Quebec riding of Abitibi- Ouest.