Alberta’s premier says she is waiting for the leader of the opposition to declare where he plans to run for a seat before calling a by-election in Lethbridge-West.
Premiere Danielle Smith was in Lethbridge Monday to support and help Lethbridge-West UCP candidate John Middleton-Hope but says she is holding off on calling an election in the riding to see where NDP leader Naheed Nenshi will be running for a legislative seat in the province. Smith says for the interest of taxpayers it would be nice to hold both by-elections at the same time and with Nenshi having been elected leader of the party back in June she thought by now one of his caucus members would have stepped down for him.
“He has a few more weeks to see if one of his MLAs would step up and make way for him so he can be in the legislature and if that doesn’t happen then we will call a by-election,” Smith says.
“It is one of two things; either he doesn’t want to get into the legislature which means he doesn’t take the job of leader of the opposition seriously, he has an obligation to get into the legislature to debate policy. So that is one, or he has a caucus that doesn’t want to make room for him and no one is stepping aside.”
Back at the end of August NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi told mylethbridgenow.com he was adjusting to partisan politics and is focusing on some of the key areas he needs to work on for the NDP. At the time he said he was splitting his time between Calgary and Edmonton, adding if a seat were to open in one of those communities then he would jump at it.
“A typical politician would ask someone to step aside so they can run, but in the world I live in the majority of my caucus were just elected a year ago. They have achieved one of their dreams which is to be an elected official and I am not the kind of guy to walk in and say hey get out of the way so I can run,” Nenshi said.
Smith’s comments come just days after NDP candidate Rob Miyashiro called on the premier to call a by-election. The Lethbridge-West riding has been without a MLA since July 1st when Shannon Phillips stepped down from her post. According to the rules, the premiere has six months to call a by-election, which would be January 1st.
