O’toole urged to rethink China stance

Chinese Canadian Conservatives say it cost 3 seats

A group representing Conservatives of Chinese descent is urging Erin O’toole to resign as federal leader, charging that his call for a tougher approach to China alienated Chinese-canadian voters and cost the party three seats in last month’s election.

The Chinese Canadian Conservative Association is advocating a less-confrontational stance toward Beijing, saying immigrants from the Mainland don’t like the Communist Party but still feel affection for China as a nation.

At a surprising news conference for local press recently, spokesman Joe Li — a regional councillor north of Toronto and three-time former Tory candidate — said the two Michaels were detained after “Canada started the war,” that China had a right to fly its planes into Taiwan’s air-defence zone and Canada should not publicly criticize Beijing’s human-rights abuses.

The association and Li cited other problems with O’toole’s leadership, too, including a shift toward the centre politically, a lack of outreach to Chinese Canadian voters and failure to embrace Peter Mackay, who lost the Tories’ last leadership race to O’toole.

But the group focused largely on what it alleged was a “hatred message” toward China in the Conservative election platform. Li said the party suggested he run again this time, but “I just don’t see myself able to win with this anti-china policy.”

“When you keep on attacking China, it sometimes translates as attacking the Chinese community,” the York Region councillor, who supported Mackay’s failed leadership bid, told the news conference. “Why don’t we leave the destiny of China to the Chinese people who live inside? ... Any time you’re interfering, what happens? You just raise the nationalism.”

A spokesman for O’toole’s office was unable to provide comment by deadline.

His leadership has come under question generally since the party failed to make major gains in the Sept. 20 election, though O’toole says he has enough support in caucus to avoid a leadership review.

After a campaign during which Liberal support in the polls dropped, the Conservatives lost three ridings with large Chinese-canadian populations — two in Richmond, B.C., and one in Markham, Ont.

But those vanquished incumbents don’t necessarily blame the platform itself.

Former MP Kenny Chiu, defeated by 3,000 votes in Steveston-richmond East, said Chinese-language news and social media were full of disinformation about the party’s position on China and his own private member’s bill to set up a registry for foreign agents. He suspects an organized campaign to distort the party’s message, while state-run media in China accused O’toole of having an anti-chinese agenda.

Chiu said Tuesday he spoke to Canadian Security Intelligence Service agents about his concerns but “by that time it was too late.”

He said the party’s stance on China is part of its long-standing tradition of standing up for human rights in other countries, noting that then-prime minister Brian Mulroney helped lead opposition to South Africa’s apartheid regime in the 1980s.

Chiu did admit the Conservatives could have done a better job of counteracting misinformation, driving home to the Chinese community it was opposed to the Chinese government, not the nation.

“We should have anticipated that kind of dirty tricks,” he said.

The Tory platform document said the Chinese Communist Party represented a “clear and rising threat” to Canada and recommended a number of measures, from “decoupling” some China trade to banning Huawei from 5G networks and urging universities against partnering with Chinese state-controlled companies.

But the preamble stressed that “our quarrel is not with the people of China — part of an ancient civilization that has contributed much to humanity. We stand especially with Chinese Canadians whose contributions to Canada are immeasurable and who are enduring an appalling rise in anti-asian hate and discrimination.”

The association was founded in 1983 to encourage Chinese Canadians to get involved in Conservative politics and boasts about 1,000 members across Canada, said executive director Eric Wen in an interview. Members include Alice Wong, who lost the Richmond Centre riding to the Liberals last month, and other former MPS.

Wen said Wechat, the Chinese-owned social-media network, was full of posts during the election suggesting the Tories were anti-chinese, a message reinforced by Chinese-language media.

“This is the concern that was expressed to me by many Mainland Chinese (immigrants),” said Li in an interview. “They’d call me: ‘What’s going on with the leader?’”

At their news conference, he and Wen advocated a more dovish approach, saying that interference in its internal affairs only invites backlash.

Many experts believe Beijing’s detention in harsh conditions of Canadians Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig was a case of “hostage diplomacy” after Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested on a U.S. extradition request. Li suggested it was a natural response from Beijing, and praised Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for using “quiet diplomacy” to end the crisis.

“Who started the war first? Canada did. They arrested Meng Wanzhou. Then China arrested the two Michaels.”

Li said he personally favours unification of Communist China and Taiwan and said Beijing’s sabre-rattling toward Taipei is just a response to the United States sending warships through the international waters of the Taiwan Strait. China recently flew a record number of military planes into Taiwan’s air-defence zone, as President Xi Jinping makes increasingly aggressive vows to unite the two territories.

“If China feels that Taiwan is part of China, they have a right to fly their planes over,” the councillor said.

He noted that Western countries generally do not officially recognize Taiwan as a separate nation. However, many maintain quasi-diplomatic relations with Taipei and have increased their support recently in response to Xi’s unification rhetoric.

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen was elected in a landslide last year on a pledge to stand up to Beijing and said Sunday her country was “on democracy’s first line of defence.”

WE SHOULD HAVE ANTICIPATED THAT KIND OF DIRTY TRICKS.