Speaking in an interview with FNA, Jonah doubted if the situation improves, and said, “This election changed almost nothing in even an electoral sense, driven by a core tactical error by the Liberal Party leader, Justin Trudeau… A second minority government will do the same or worse than before.”
Aidan Jonah is a journalist and radio host based in Canada. He is the founder and editor-in-chief of the Canada Files, an anti-imperialist publication focusing on Canadian foreign policy. Jonah’s articles on imperialism, federal politics and left-wing resistance to colonialism have been published by Canadian Dimension, Palestine Chronicle, the Orinoco Tribune, Dissident Voice and many other outlets.
Below is the full text of the interview:
Q: Trudeau called the elections two years early in hopes of securing a parliamentary majority; Canadians did not give Trudeau the majority mandate he wanted, though. Why did it happen?
A: Justin Trudeau assumed that Canada would have been far ahead into the vaccination process by the time the election was called in August. Instead, a fourth-wave of COVID-19 had begun in Canada, while the anti-vaccine activists and the far-right more broadly began to see results in building the far-right People's Party of Canada. The peace movement had limited impact in this election, while the only real foreign policy element was on which party could more aggressively bash China, with the NDP (New Democratic Party) and the Conservatives leading the way in calling for Canada to take action and resist "Chinese state power". In essence, this election changed almost nothing in even an electoral sense, driven by a core tactical error by the Liberal Party leader, Justin Trudeau.
Q: Under Trudeau, people saw a set of scandal accusations, anti-vaccine protests, pebbles pelted on his campaign trail, etc. How do you assess his ruling since 2015 so far? Do you believe his future minority government can do any better?
A: Trudeau's governance has been filled with broken promises and subservience to the USA's foreign policy. On the domestic front, he broke his promise to have the 2015 election be the last one under First Past The Post, refused to implement the Pharmacare, broke promises to protect the environment while instead buying pipelines, among many other promises. On the foreign policy front, the Trudeau government has been a pathetic lackey for the USA government, whether it is putting up no protest for Trump ramping up sanctions on Cuba, led the now almost fully collapsed Lima Group which was founded in 2017 to overthrow the Venezuelan government, and arrested Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou based on illegal US sanctions against Iran in 2018, only releasing her at the end of September 2021. This is just a limited version of the foreign policy overview for Canada. Our government is truly an awful actor at home and abroad, so a second minority government will do the same or worse than before.
Q: How do you find yet another minority government not formed by Trudeau, but by another person?
A: A second minority government at least prevents the ruling liberals from imposing absolute austerity, to make Canadian citizens pay even more for the COVID-19 response, even more than the dozens of billions our government looted from the Canadian taxpayers and fed the money to wealthy corporations, through the Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy (which was supported by the NDP). So this minority government changes little at the end of the day. Trudeau will intentionally not deliver on his promises, as all of the Canadian mainstream parties would if in government, since they all serve Canada's wealthy elites.
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