It’s only a matter of days now until the provincial election kicks off and yet the NDP’s dysfunction as a government is on full display in the Manitoba Legislature.
It has been more than a year since NDP Leader Greg Selinger survived a political revolt when several senior members of his Cabinet resigned, sparking a leadership challenge. And yet, a year later, he is still haunted by that rebellion. Throughout this past week questions have been asked about alleged deals that happened during the leadership that allowed Mr. Selinger to get delegate support during his leadership. There were no shortage of concerns raised about how Mr. Selinger survived the leadership challenge and in fact one riding, Swan River, had to redo their vote entirely when it was alleged that a supporter of Mr. Selinger, a former NDP Cabinet Minister, was filling out ballots for seniors without their knowledge.
While these allegations concern an NDP leadership race, they also involve tax dollars and the principles of our democracy.
Over the past two months, several senior NDP Cabinet Ministers have announced that they will not be seeking re-election despite the fact that many of them had already been nominated to run for election. While each NDP member not seeking re-election will have their own individual reason for not running, collectively it gives the appearance that many are simply not interested in going into an election with Mr. Selinger as their leader.
That seemed to be confirmed last week when the Winnipeg Free Press reported that at an NDP Caucus meeting held only days earlier, an NDP MLA shouted at Mr. Selinger that based on what he was hearing at the door, people would not vote for Greg Selinger. This resulted in several heated exchanges before the NDP MLA stormed out of the meeting according to the report.
It was no secret that there were deep divisions within the NDP Caucus after their leadership revolt, but the fact that those divisions not only persist but seem to be growing deeper every day makes it difficult for the government to operate properly.
Manitobans seem to have grown weary of the scandal and internal division that they see every day within the NDP. In fact it’s likely that many NDP supporters have grown tired of it as well. It is clear that the NDP hardly trust each other, so why would any Manitoban trust them.
While the NDP struggles to both manage government and internal divisions the April 19th election date will provide Manitobans with an opportunity to elect a new government and one that will go to the Manitoba Legislature as a united team. It’s a change that is desperately needed.
