A late-spring blizzard wasn\u2019t enough to stop Parker Metz from coming out to take a stand for national unity on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s freezing cold, it\u2019s April and it should be warm \u2014 but this is important,\u201d said the 21-year-old student, sporting a Team Canada jersey and waving a Maple Leaf flag on a hockey stick. \u201cI\u2019m an Albertan and I\u2019m proud to be one. I\u2019ve lived in Lethbridge and I\u2019ve lived here in Edmonton. Our province is beautiful.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut, our country is better. I love Canada.\u201d<\/p>\n
There was more Canadian pride in the air than snow, as roughly 60 people set out to knock on doors across the Windemere neighbourhood, kicking off the \u201cFor Alberta, For Canada\u201d campaign to rally supporters of confederation to be ready for a potential fall referendum on Alberta separation.<\/p>\n
Spearheaded by the Alberta NDP, the campaign will be putting boots on the ground across Alberta all summer, with the goal of raising awareness of the potential threat of separation or possibly even annexation by the United States.<\/p>\n
Metz said that wasn\u2019t going to happen on his watch.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will always be a Canadian first and wherever Canada needs me I will be,\u201d he said. \u201cCanada means freedom, it means liberty, it means equality. It\u2019s a cultural mosaic \u2014 you can be you and you can be OK, and I think that\u2019s a wonderful thing.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we were on our own that would be a problem, seeing as how our government has shown they\u2019re willing to push their agenda with things like the Notwithstanding Clause.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is the second official campaign to rally support from Albertans, following the Forever Canadian campaign led by former deputy premier Thomas Lukaszuk, which collected 456,365 signatures in 90 days, just shy of 10 per cent of the population.<\/p>\n
Saying there\u2019s enough love for Canada for multiple campaigns, Alberta NDP deputy leader Rakhi Pancholi said For Alberta, For Canada isn\u2019t competition but adds to the work of the Forever Canadian movement.<\/p>\n
\u201c(Lukaszuk)\u2019s done incredible work with Forever Canadian,\u201d she said. \u201cThose volunteers are incredible, but this is a group effort. We\u2019ve seen thousands of Albertans sign up at our website. They\u2019ve been engaging and sending emails to committee members for the Forever Canada petition. This is just the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a political party, Pancholi noted the Alberta NDP wouldn\u2019t be hampered by third-party advertiser spending rules that may limit how much other groups can get the message out.<\/p>\n
She added she was trying to avoid the mistakes made in other life-changing referendums in recent history, such as Brexit.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe premier\u2019s made it clear there\u2019s going to be a referendum on Oct. 19, we imagine at some point there\u2019s going to be one with the separatist question,\u201d said Pancholi. \u201cWe want to make sure we\u2019re talking to our neighbours right away. Being able to mobilize is really important \u2014 we haven\u2019t had the referendum called yet but when it is called it might just be a few months to the referendum date.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeparatists are going to be very mobilized, we know that. We need to make sure Albertans take this issue seriously, so it\u2019s about getting people active as soon as possible, because by the time that date is called it will be a short campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n
Former Alberta premier and United Conservative Party founder Jason Kenney has also spoken in favour of preserving confederation. He is set to debate 2022 Freedom Convoy lawyer Keith Wilson on the subject May 1, one day before the deadline for separatists to collect 177,732 signatures. Separatist leader Jeffrey Rath says they already have the required signatures, but hasn\u2019t presented any evidence to support his claim.<\/p>\n
ebowling@postmedia.com<\/a><\/p>\n Related<\/p>\n Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don\u2019t miss the news you need to know \u2014 add EdmontonJournal.com<\/a> and EdmontonSun.com<\/a> to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.<\/a><\/p>\n You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber. Subscribers gain unlimited access to The Edmonton Journal, Edmonton Sun, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Edmonton Journal<\/a> | The Edmonton Sun.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A late-spring blizzard wasn\u2019t enough to stop Parker Metz from coming out to take a stand for national…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19780,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9886,9889,17,9888,9890,9885,9887,8869],"class_list":{"0":"post-19779","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-alberta-ndp","9":"tag-albertan","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-canadian-campaign","12":"tag-parker-metz","13":"tag-rakhi-pancholi","14":"tag-team-canada-jersey","15":"tag-thomas-lukaszuk"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19779\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}