A critical analysis of political fraud
During the 2011 Canadian election, a series of automated calls took place across Ontario that informed voters that venues had changed, and provided new locations for ballots to be registered. However, the calls proved to be a sabotage mission created by the Conservative Party to help redirect voters they knew based on their CIMS (the Constituency Management System) database were not supporters of their political perspective.
Flash forward to May 2013, where Marc Mayrand has begun to uncover some of those responsible for the robocall scandal. Mayrand is Canada’s Chief Electoral Officer and is responsible for investigating election fraud across the country. Since the robocalls happened, Mayrand has been petitioning for the rights of Elections Canada to gain access to the databases, and the documented uses of these databases by all of the major federal parties during the election period. The Huffington Post stated that Mayrand is desperate to find some sort of transparency within politics as his job becomes more and more difficult with the intensifying defensive stance of Conservative Party members.
The House of Commons has sadly denied the exposure of critical information and endowed major political parties with the ability to essentially govern how their own party gathers voting support. With so much of the election process being privatized, people within these major political parties have a sense of invincibility as their actions can’t be fully investigated and they can’t be forced to explain themselves. This is obviously a system that is archaic and outdated, to say the least.
Conservative Parliamentary Secretary Tom Lukiwski made a statement in the Ottawa Citizen that until the investigation is over, the public perception of his party will be based on controversies, rather than political merit. With this, Lukiwski does a great job at deflecting the blame off of the party and onto the specific individuals who used the CIMS database to commit these offenses.
Although the Conservatives had supplied all of the documents requested by Elections Canada, many of their representatives either refused to comment or cancelled interviews at the last minute. These are tactics that mock the justice system in Canada and completely undermine the seriousness of the allegations presented towards the Conservative party.
At the center of this issue is Guelph, the only city in which someone was actually charged in relation to the controversy. A Guelph Conservative representative is being charged with using a government database for the express purposes of interfering with the election process. Although this is something that is fairly widespread, it is in our city that someone was brought to justice, even if the maximum penalty possible under the Criminal Code of Canada in these instances is a five-year jail sentence. But, Guelph is a city that is no stranger to the questionable political tactics of the Conservatives.
At a speaking event for Steven Harper at the University of Guelph in April of 2011, students were removed from the building and denied the chance to see the Prime Minister speak, despite registering themselves to attend. This effectively kept any confrontation from occurring during Harper’s speech, but it also completely destroyed any sense of dialogue between citizens and their elected leader.
Issues such as the robocalls are no longer about political ideology, be it Right or Left, Liberal or Conservative, but rather an issue of identity and political reputation. How can our nation expect to have a functioning and respected government if the tactics it uses to implement itself are steeped in controversy? It is now on the shoulders of Canadians to become effectively educated and make their political choices based on facts. This is crucial in keeping ourselves from being victimized by sleazy political maneuvering.