If anything is likely to undermine public confidence, it is not PQ candidate Pascal Paradis’ political shopping. It’s more of a lie. Because obviously, someone is not telling the truth. Not the whole truth, at least.
Posted 1:27 a.m. Updated 6:00 a.m.
Here is the version of Mr. Paradis, director of Avocats sans frontières. Shortly before the 2022 elections, he would have been approached by the CAQ. He met Martin Koskinen, chief of staff of François Legault. Mr. Paradis allegedly told him that he was a sovereignist and a social democrat and that he opposed the third link. He would have been told that the under-river tunnel would never be built and that he had only to keep silent about it during the campaign. A post of Minister of the Capitale-Nationale would also have been promised to him. But he declined the offer, which did not seem to him reliable enough.
Here is now the version of the CAQ. Mr. Paradis was indeed considered as a candidate in Charlevoix–Côte-de-Beaupré. The interest was mutual. The lawyer was interested enough himself to send his CV. He met the party leader and Mr. Koskinen. However, he had greedy requirements. He demanded a paid apartment before and during the campaign, in addition to a guarantee of becoming a minister. These two conditions were refused. And he was never told that the third link would be abandoned.
Who to believe? Impossible to decide beyond any doubt. But one thing is certain, the versions are irreconcilable, and some details are more believable than others.
When the third link was dropped, influential MPs like Bernard Drainville were surprised and even troubled. If it was planned, the secret was very well kept. Why would Mr. Koskinen, a Cartesian and prudent man, have entrusted this bomb to a relative stranger who admitted to being a sovereigntist, and therefore possibly close to the PQ? And would he really have promised a ministerial post to Mr. Paradis? Because even if his career as a lawyer impresses, he remained a neophyte politician, there was a congestion of ministerial candidates in the Capitale-Nationale and the party tried first to recruit women.
PHOTO MARTIN TREMBLAY, ARCHIVES LA PRESSE
Prime Minister François Legault and his chief of staff, Martin Koskinen, in 2018
On the other hand, the choice of Mr. Paradis as responsible for the Capitale-Nationale would not have been illogical. Relations promised to be delicate with the mayor of Quebec, Bruno Marchand. However, the latter is a personal friend of Mr. Paradis. The CAQ would have benefited from it.
We will never have the verbatim of the meeting between MM. Koskinen and Paradise. It is possible that it was rich in innuendo, which would explain their contradictory interpretations.
In this case, it is the voters’ perception that counts. The turnaround on the third road link was so dramatic and unexpected that people are still looking for an explanation. Whether true or false, Mr. Paradis’ version could therefore be popular.
The political consequences are easier to analyze.
This is the first by-election since the abandonment of the third link, it takes place in Quebec and it occurs while the PQ is regaining strength.
The PQ positions itself as a group of idealists who fight for their convictions even when they are unpopular. He claims that the CAQ is on the contrary a coalition of people attracted to power.
This is why the troops of Paul St-Pierre Plamondon energetically recuperate the death of the third road link: they make it a symbol of the opportunism of the CAQ, which said one thing in the campaign to do the opposite after its election.
This is also precisely why the CAQ took the risk of revealing its confidential exchanges with Mr. Paradis. She wanted to demonstrate that opportunism exists among her opponents.
And this is finally why the PQ, faithful to its new strategy, is doing judo. He recovers unfavorable news to launch a counter-attack, even if it means playing the victim.
The PQ claim to have in their possession compromising text messages for the CAQ, but do not relay them out of respect for confidentiality. They thus let the worst suspicions dangle without proof. It’s too easy.
Still, by sinking its exchanges again, the CAQ risks undermining the confidence of future sources or candidates approached during the next round of recruitment.
If the CAQ and the PQ are fighting bare-knuckled, it is because they feel that this election is a turning point.
The CAQ’s rise to power began with a by-election in 2017 in Louis-Hébert. She does not want the one in Jean-Talon to mark the beginning of her slow decline. The ballot where the population assimilated it to the other old parties which betray their word.
For the PQ, the campaign in Jean-Talon is on the contrary a perfect opportunity to position itself as the main adversary of the government. The political shopping of Mr. Paradis is embarrassing news that turns into advantageous controversy, because the partial is now presented as a PQ-CAQ confrontation.
In Jean-Talon, we do not know who is telling the truth, but we know who these detours in the face of the truth are likely to benefit.
2023-08-25 17:23:05
#judo #Press
