The battle for the management of the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives is three months from being determined, and the 2 males vying for the function are laying out totally different paths to attempt to reignite the celebration voted out of workplace within the final election.
Obby Khan, a former professional soccer participant, cupboard minister and enterprise proprietor from Winnipeg, has pitched himself because the skilled candidate with a seat within the legislature who can construct a “massive tent” of city and rural members. Khan’s Fort Whyte seat is considered one of two the Tories nonetheless maintain in Winnipeg, the place 32 of the 57 legislature seats are positioned.
Wally Daudrich, a longtime celebration board member and lodge proprietor from the northern city of Churchill, has promised to carry a extra conservative strategy if he wins. He has stated the Tories have misplaced their means in recent times and grow to be one thing like a Liberal celebration.
Khan, who has obtained endorsements from some high-profile Tories resembling longtime former cupboard minister Kelvin Goertzen, would usually be thought of a really clear front-runner, one political analyst stated, however something can occur underneath the celebration’s system that permits each member to vote for the chief.
“The proper-of-centre, the agricultural a part of the celebration — will we see that coming ahead and doing a severe problem?” Christopher Adams, an adjunct professor of political research on the College of Manitoba, stated.
The final management race in 2021 noticed Heather Stefanson obtain many big-name endorsements and be thought of the institution candidate. However hundreds of individuals signed up as members earlier than the vote and Shelly Glover, a former federal cupboard minister who had left politics in 2015, got here a really shut second with 49 per cent of the votes.
Daudrich’s guarantees are considerably akin to these of some Republicans in the USA, Adams stated. Daudrich has stated he would shrink the dimensions of presidency and eradicate the provincial gasoline tax. He calls himself pro-life however would let grassroots members set coverage on abortion and different points. And he says some supporters have joined him as a result of the schooling system has grow to be “an indoctrination system.”
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Daudrich has additionally stated, within the context of current protests and vandalism concentrating on Jews in Canada, that folks from different international locations who don’t “respect our legal guidelines and our traditions” must be deported.
Daudrich stated in an interview he was referring to hate speech and threats of violence.
“These individuals who need to take part in that sort of rhetoric, in the event that they’re not residents of our nation, sure I consider that they’ve vocally chosen to return to the nation of origin,” Daudrich stated.
Khan could also be considered because the extra city and progressive candidate, Adams stated, however he has confronted criticism for campaigning on parental rights in faculties throughout the 2023 election.
The marketing campaign promise was vaguely worded and included a mother or father’s proper to be concerned in addressing a scholar’s behavioural modifications. Some critics and activists stated the Tories have been making a coded risk to transgender rights.
Khan stated in an interview he’s reaching out to all members and has been touring rural Manitoba
“I’ll proceed to … develop the celebration the way in which I’ve at all times achieved, and that’s by way of bringing everybody collectively in a big-tent celebration. And we will do this inside our conservative values,” Khan stated.
The race thus far has been pretty tame, with solely the occasional verbal volley being fired.
Daudrich has stated he’s the one conservative within the race. Khan has stated Daudrich’s messaging could be very totally different from his big-tent strategy.
“The place different folks may need to divide us, I need to unite us.”
Celebration members will select the subsequent chief through mail-in and drop-off ballots, with the winner to be introduced April 26.
In contrast to the final management race, the celebration’s one-member-one-vote course of will incorporate some extent system to restrict the load of constituencies with massive membership numbers. The intention is to make sure that the management race can’t be determined by a flood of recent members in a single or two constituencies.
A constituency with 100 voting members will get 100 factors within the management vote. One with 400 member votes would get 200 factors, and no constituency would get greater than 500 factors. The candidate with a majority of factors wins.
The competition began final July when nominations opened. The months-long marketing campaign offers management hopefuls extra time to fulfill members, a celebration official stated.
“It offers the candidates a possibility to get out into communities and cities and cities that they in any other case wouldn’t be capable to,” Brad Zander, chair of the management election committee, stated.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
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