This is not the kind of thing any political party wants to deal with an election call only weeks away.
Alberta Party leader Stephen Mandel and five of the party’s candidates and their chief financial officers have been deemed ineligible to run as candidates or serve as CFOs in the 2019 election. The decision from Elections Alberta includes a 5-year ban from seeking provincial political office or serving in a CFO role.
The decision impacts Mandel, who was nominated in Edmonton-McClung, Rachel Timmermans in Calgary-Lougheed, Ali Haymour in Edmonton-Decore, Diana Ly in Edmonton-Gold Bar, Amrit Matharu in Edmonton-Meadows, and Moe Rahall in Edmonton-Castle Downs.
Mandel became leader of the centre-right Alberta Party in February 2018. He previously served as Mayor of Edmonton from 2004 to 2013 and as the Progressive Conservative MLA for Edmonton-Whitemud and Minister of Health from 2014 to 2015.
The ban also applies to Mandel’s CFO, Brian Heidecker, who previously served as CFO for numerous PC Party candidates and for Doug Griffiths’ campaign during his 2011 bid for that party’s leadership.
Sources in the party tell me this decision was a result of missed deadlines or improperly submitted paperwork filed by the candidates and their CFOs with Elections Alberta following their nomination meetings.
Section 57 of Alberta’s Election Act allows the Chief Elections Officer to deem an individual as prohibited from being nominated as a provincial election candidate for a period of eight or five years if they fail to file required statements with Elections Alberta. (In September 2017, I wrote about some other past candidates who were included in this list).
The party’s lawyers are planning to challenge the Elections Alberta decision at the Court of Queen’s Bench.
If the court overturns the Elections Alberta decision, this is still a pretty embarrassing situation. But if the court does not overturn the ban, the Alberta Party may be scrambling to find a new leader with only a few weeks before an election call.
NDP CFO on the banned list
Also recently included on the list is the New Democratic Party‘s Director of Operations Will Gammon, who serves as Chief Financial Officer for 9 of the party’s nominated or soon-to-be nominated candidates and 18 of the party’s registered constituency associations. Gammon’s appearance on the list appears to a result of his role a CFO for Innisfail-Sylvan Lake by-election candidate Nicole Mooney, who is also now ineligible to run as a candidate for the next 5 years.
Former PC Party MLA Steve Young, who was unsuccessful in his bid to win the United Conservative Party nomination in Edmonton-Glenora, and Shaun Collicott, who lost a bid for the UCP nomination in Edmonton-Rutherford, are also on the banned list.
9 replies on “Friday Night Bombshell: Stephen Mandel and 5 Alberta Party candidates ineligible to run as candidates in 2019 election”
Bring back Greg Clark!
ho boy.
1. If Mandel can’t fill out simple paperwork how can he expect to convince us he’ll be a good premier or opposition leader?
2. What the hell is wrong inside the Alberta Party that they can’t get simple paperwork filled out complete and on time?
3. Is Greg Clark ready to take over as leader again if Mandel doesn’t get the ban overruled?
Calling the party “centre right” is inaccurate and unfair. There is no sense in which the party is on the right of the political spectrum any more than on the left. That is, you could point to just as many things on each as evidence, so it is disingenuous to choose ‘right’. Just because they oppose the NDP doesnt make them conservative.
“HOWEVER…there is a much better conservative option than the UCP, and that is Alberta Party. If you want to vote conservative again but you can’t stand to support the far-right, your only choice is Alberta Party. Our candidates stand for conservative values without fear mongering and heavy -fisted tactics. That’s why I am running for Alberta Party. We are your Alberta alternative; we are your best choice for the 2019 Alberta provincial election.” – Ali Haymour, the now ineligible Alberta Party candidate from Edmonton-Decore
http://www.vote4haymour.ca/
Scary things 🙁
Perhaps this is all for the best for the Alberta Party. Mr. Mandel sure as heck wasn’t catching on as Alberta Party leader. The party was definitely moving in a more conservative direction, so it seems to me the most fertile ground for it would be in Calgary where fiscally conservative, socially progressive voters, who might be reluctant to support Kenney, are most numerous and where the Alberta Party already has 3 MLA’s. Accordingly, it might not be such a bad thing to go back to Mr. Clark as leader and hope voters do not dwell too much on this lapse.
A last minute change in leaders is not unheard of and while tricky, seemed to work for the Ontario PC’s not too long ago. Of course, they were doing much better in the polls at the time than the Alberta Party is now. I suppose the Alberta Party really needed to do something to get everyone’s attention and while this may not be the best way to go about it, at least they do have our attention, at least for the momemt now.
Both Mandel and Kenney are poor Leaders. We know Main Street political polls every time are more propaganda then reality. Replace both Leaders,!
A news letter, email, sent out by the Alberta Party on May 16, 2018 declared Mandel as their candidate for Edmonton -Glen. That he was selected on May 12,2018. That means it was all said and done on May 12. How can he now claim that the contest closed on July 12.??
Nope. The Edmonton-Glenora candidate is Glen Tickner and he was selected on the fall of 2018.