Marois wants to lead PQ revolution

Marois wants to lead PQ revolution; Veteran sovereignist, a former cabinet minister, is so far staring down the hardliners in her bid to take charge of a party that finds itself in disarray after a disastrous election, Sean Gordon reports; [ONT Edition]
Sean Gordon. Toronto Star. Toronto, Ont.: May 19, 2007. pg. B.4
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Personnes : Boisclair, Andre, Marois, Ian Barrett CP Pauline
Auteur(s) : Sean Gordon
Origine : MONTREAL
Section : National Report
Titre de la publication : Toronto Star. Toronto, Ont.: May 19, 2007. pg. B.4
Type de source : Newspaper
ISSN : 03190781
Identificateur du document ProQuest : 1273733191
Nombre de mots : 1191
URL du document : http://proquest.umi.com.res.bnquebec.ca/pqdweb?did=1273733191&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=63793&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Résumé (Résumé du document)
Former PQ cabinet minister [Ian Barrett CP Pauline Marois] officially entered a leadership race this week that is widely expected to feature only one candidate. And the putative leader threw down the gauntlet to the "purs et durs" by saying she would shelve a key PQ promise to hold a referendum as soon as possible and concentrate on selling the "sovereignty project" instead.

Even Patrick Bourgeois, editor of the independantiste newspaper Le Quebecois and no Marois fan, offered only tepid criticism of her apparent "coronation" and told Le Devoir "we're not thrilled, but I'm not going to self-immolate on the public square."

Part of the muted reaction is due to the PQ's slumping fortunes - and indeed those of the sovereignty movement - and a realization that despite the fierce opposition to Marois in the 2005 leadership race, where she was painted as yesterday's woman, she may well have been a better choice than [Andre Boisclair], the "renewal" candidate.

Texte intégral (1191 mots)
(Copyright (c) 2007 Toronto Star, All Rights Reserved.)
The cartoon is taped to office cubicle walls throughout the National Assembly.

Drawn by an artist at Quebec City's Le Soleil, it shows two people under a banner that says "Nouveau Parti des Purs et Durs." One asks the other, seated at a desk beside a Quebec flag, who the party's leader will be.

The reply "I don't know, but we already hate them."

It's an especially big hit among staffers of the Parti Quebecois, where for decades a vocal and disproportionately influential minority of "pur et dur" (purist and hardline) sovereignists has held sway and dictated terms, even to the party's most iconic leaders. But that could be about to change.

Former PQ cabinet minister Pauline Marois officially entered a leadership race this week that is widely expected to feature only one candidate. And the putative leader threw down the gauntlet to the "purs et durs" by saying she would shelve a key PQ promise to hold a referendum as soon as possible and concentrate on selling the "sovereignty project" instead.

And the hardest of the hardcore sovereignists mostly caved.

Marois' return to politics after a 15-month hiatus is a direct result of Andre Boisclair's calamitous stewardship of the party, which relegated the PQ to a dismal third-place showing in the March 26 election and led to his exit earlier this month.

More worryingly for sovereignists, the PQ lost considerable ground to the right-leaning Action democratique du Quebec, which became the official opposition to the Liberals' shaky minority government.

The president of SPQ Libre, the PQ's left-wing party-within-a-party, welcomed Marois' candidacy and said little about her pledge, which amounts to political heresy in some party circles. (Boisclair was pilloried for making a similar suggestion.)

A spokesperson for Mouvement pour une election sur la souverainete, which favours a "referendum election" as the means to achieve sovereignty, said the 700-member group has opted to support Marois.

Even Patrick Bourgeois, editor of the independantiste newspaper Le Quebecois and no Marois fan, offered only tepid criticism of her apparent "coronation" and told Le Devoir "we're not thrilled, but I'm not going to self-immolate on the public square."

Part of the muted reaction is due to the PQ's slumping fortunes - and indeed those of the sovereignty movement - and a realization that despite the fierce opposition to Marois in the 2005 leadership race, where she was painted as yesterday's woman, she may well have been a better choice than Boisclair, the "renewal" candidate.

It appears the third time will indeed be lucky for Marois, who also ran for the party leadership in 1985, and if so, the revolution will not stop at shifting the focus away from a referendum.

Marois also wants to re-centre the PQ's vision of nationalism, away from the recent appeal to so-called "civic nationalism" - which includes a pitch to new immigrants and second-generation ethnic communities - to include a stronger dose of the traditional defence of the old stock francophone identity.

"The values we share, whatever our origins, are well known We are francophones first and foremost ... democratic, tolerant, but desiring the respect of our identity," Marois, 58, said in her campaign launch speech this week.

It's a key change that inevitably means stronger emphasis on language policy and culture.

After having elected Boisclair, a fervent champion of civic nationalism, the party is clearly poised for a rethink.

"Identity must be at the heart of the national project, and yes there is a reflection needed on that," Pierre Curzi, an actor-cum-politician who won election in March, told the Star recently. "The last election showed us that people are divided and relatively dissatisfied with the current parties. I think the first job is to understand more deeply the aspirations of the people ... on the questions of identity."

Some saw Curzi as a potential challenger to Marois, but he instead threw his support behind her in a move that may have sealed the fate of Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe's ill-fated dalliance with running.

There is a sense among senior party members that the PQ needed to stare into the electoral abyss in order to reinvent itself. The unspoken corollary is that renewal can only be led by someone with long experience and unassailable credibility.

"There are some profound changes that have been required since the 2003 (electoral) defeat, and maybe we haven't had the courage to face them. Pauline can change that," said Francois Legault, a former PQ education and health minister.

Legault and others have been pushing for the PQ to adjust its conception of nationalism, and to advocate a more pragmatic form of socialism.

The trick for Marois, who seems calmer, more relaxed and more poised than she did in 2005, is to move the PQ closer to its cultural roots and into the political centre, promoting the dream of sovereignty without threatening a referendum.

It's the recipe used by Rene Levesque and Lucien Bouchard - leaders who have won elections.

Pollster Jean-Marc Leger calls it the sovereignist paradox voters tend to support an independent state, but don't want the break-up of Canada. Comedian Yvon Deschamps said it best "An independent Quebec within a strong and united Canada."

Marois might be just the person to lead a sovereignist revival. She's a sort of PQ chameleon not a hardliner, but she speaks their language; a resolutely left-wing politician who has nevertheless made conservative decisions as finance minister; a wealthy suburbanite, but who hails from humble semi-rural roots. She grew up in a hamlet south of Quebec City, where her father was an auto mechanic.

All of which could be bad news for the opposition ADQ. It will be worse news for Premier Jean Charest's Liberals, who sit at a historic low of 18 per cent support among francophones, and who have also managed to alienate many in the party's anglophone base by naming only one anglophone cabinet minister.

The PQ remains strong in some regions and Marois has already changed her approach from 2005, toning down her image as a haughty bourgeoise, using more direct language and emphasising her experience and knowledge of Quebec.

The mother of four grown children - she is married to multi-millionaire businessman Claude Blanchet, who once ran the province's investment arm and left amid allegations of scandal - will be a redoubtable opponent for ADQ Leader Mario Dumont, and Charest, assuming he decides to stay on to fight the next election.

If Marois is proposing a revolution in the PQ, it's because she's betting the party needs her more than she needs it.

"I am proposing to set aside the referendum timetable ... If people choose me, they will also be choosing this new direction," she told reporters this week.

The subtext couldn't be clearer You owe me for last time, and if you don't want me, I'll be perfectly happy to go back to tending my flower garden.

[Illustration]
Ian Barrett CP Pauline Marois, right, accepts flowers after announcing her candidacy for the Parti Quebecois leadership in Montreal on Sunday. It appears the third time will indeed be lucky for Marois, who also ran for the party leadership in 2005 and 1985.
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"La révolution est à bâtir, ou bien elle se dissipe".
-Jacques Berque

"On ne peut pas dire la vérité à la télévision: il y a trop de gens qui regardent"
- Coluche