Fearing separatists can't win a referendum, former Quebec premier Jacques Parizeau wants the Parti Québécois to declare its next election victory will be a vote to leave Canada.

In a thinly veiled attack on current PQ Leader Bernard Landry, whose leadership is under question by many hard-line sovereignists, Parizeau said it's time for the party to review its "step-by-step" approach to separation. He criticized the old-guard's 30-year fixation on a referendum as the only road to forming a new country.

Proposing a radical switch in strategy, Parizeau, 74, says if the PQ runs on a clear mandate to separate and wins a majority, even without 50 per cent of the vote, it would have the same legal and moral force as a referendum.

"In short, the Parti Québécois would run in the next election and ask for the mandate to realize sovereignty," Parizeau said.

"If (the PQ) wins, it will begin to prepare for (independence) by proclaiming a provisional constitution in accordance with which, among other measures, a Quebec citizenship would be instituted and a constitutional court would be created."

Parizeau, who was PQ premier during the 1995 referendum, believes this approach gets around the federal government's Clarity Act, which would subject a future referendum to Supreme Court of Canada oversight.

Bakunin.......we have had enough muddying the waters and that is why the Clarity Act exists although I for one, do not support it.

What Parizeau is suggesting is that a PQ victory in the next Quebec election is sovereignty for Quebec.

But critics say the federal government would strongly oppose separation no matter how it was declared

Right now, Parizeau's proposal of a one-step course to sovereignty ensures that the sovereignist movement will spend the next year embroiled in a heated, divisive debate over its strategy. For the PQ is home to a vocal constituency whose place within the party is disproportionately high relative to its influence within Quebec society at large.

And the federal government would also partition New-Brunswick so that its francophone Acadian minority would be added to partitioned Québec. If Québec is divisible so are....
And there is this three square-block in Baconsfield which is mostly francophone which then would have to be partitioned off, too, except for those two houses that.....
And then, there is this person who wanted to vote one way with his head, but the other with his heart. Off to the partitioning block we go.

As Trudeau said: If Canada is divisible, so is Quebec!

unfortunantley in your overzealousness to make a point you forgot that partitioning would allow people who live in a pro-federalist Area to stay in canada, it is extremly ignorant of yourself to assume that just because those three square blocks in Baconsfield speak french they want to seperate.

Just as it his to think that because some quebecers want to stay in canada, they are ready to split quebec. There is a reason why this has never been discuss... First the quebec population is not interested and 2nd, the politician are not interested. The one interested are outsiders who are frustrated about quebecers.

who are you talkign to, I never even mentioned my opinions on partitioning except to inform someone that his attempt to be funny fell very flat from his lack of understanding of the situation, i never said quebec wanted to be partitioned nor that it should be i said it would allow people in a pro-federalist area to stay in canada, not that it shoudl be enacted, must be enacted, or was a viable alternative, just what it would do, i didn't go beyond that and divulge my own personal opinions or fealings on the matter.

They try to avoid these issues in every way possible. That's very understandable. But avoidance does mean necessarily that it doesn't happen.

These seperatists need to be deport somewhere far away, so they cause problems for another country.

Bakunin, are you in favour of Quebec leaving Canada? This is a serious question (not dogmatic). If so, why? It seems to me that culture is constantly being rendered irrational and collectivist in the current neo-liberal, globalized context. Will Quebec culture be able to withstand these forces if it leaves Canada? Does not Canada offer protection for Quebec culture and significant autonomy?

As someone from the West, I do not quite understand the motive for leaving. I do not understand what Quebec cannot accomplish from within Canada. I am eager to hear from someone who does really understand these reasons.

In another post, you claimed to be more comfortable in NYC (I think you said NYC but I might be wrong) than in other Cdn cities. Can you explain further?

Nothing undemocratic about Parizeau's proposal
Josée Legault
The Montréal Gazette 20.8.2004

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's a truly Pavlovian phenomenon. Every time Jacques Parizeau speaks up, the media and prominent péquistes rally to admonish him with almost equal fervour.

So it went after Monsieur penned a two-page newspaper article suggesting the Parti Québécois take a different road to sovereignty. His plan was called undemocratic, vengeful, desperate, bitter, deceitful, illegitimate, despicable and monstrous. Bernard Landry and Stéphane Dion even united in denouncing Monsieur's plan as illegitimate. To quote Aislin's famed cartoon: "OK, everybody. Take a Valium!"

So why all the mayhem?

On Monday, La Presse's frontpage story about Parizeau's plan had this title: "No need for another referendum. Parizeau supports the idea of a referendum-election." So Monsieur wanted Quebec to become independent without a referendum.

The problem is that Parizeau wrote nothing of the sort. In fact, he suggested the PQ go into an election asking for a clear mandate to trigger a process that would lead to a referendum on a new constitution for a sovereign Quebec. Only a majority vote in that referendum would allow Quebec to become independent.

This idea is based on a short essay by Robert Laplante, director of L'Action Nationale. All Parizeau did was express his support for a position that is increasingly popular inside and outside PQ ranks, but to which most of the media had paid no attention. Parizeau's sortie took care of that.

So much so that the Council on Sovereignty will hold a two-day forum on the subject Oct. 1 and 2, where Parizeau will speak. There will also be a resolution tabled at the PQ's coming national council asking for a special symposium on the Laplante plan and other avenues. It's even winning over some PQ MNAs as more and more younger members start to support it.

So if the Parizeau-Laplante approach is so popular and it does call for a referendum, why did Landry call it illegitimate and undemocratic?

The answer to this question is of paramount importance. It exposes the real stakes that lie behind what some see as just another "chicane" inside the PQ.

The answer is that Laplante's approach goes against everything PQ leaders - other than Parizeau - have defended for years.

First, it says the PQ must be elected on a clear mandate to trigger the preparation of sovereignty with public funds. This is what Parizeau did in 1994, while his successors refused such a commitment, waiting instead for "winning conditions" and the "moral certainty to win."

Second, the Laplante plan entails "gestures of sovereignty" that would, among other things, allow a PQ government to enact a Quebec citizenship while Quebec still remains in Canada. Landry and Bouchard refused to do that when other soverefgnists suggested the same thing in the past.

Third, it advocates the adoption of a voter ID card to reduce voter fraud at the next referendum. Again, Bouchard refused to do just that while Landry, though he had promised to, never did.

More importantly - and this is the biggest stake of all - the Laplante plan means the end of "étapisme," a step-by-step, referendum-based strategy brought into the PQ - in 1974 by Claude Morin, a former RCMP paid informant.

The Laplante plan does that not because it rejects the holding of a referendum. It doesn't. But because a referendum on a constitution would mark the "end" of the process, the founding act of an independent Quebec.

This is radically different from Bouchard and Landry's position: a referendum as the first stage of negotiations with Canada. Many "soft soverefgnists" even view a referendum victory as a way to establish a "rapport de force" to negotiate a new deal with Canada, a sort of confederal union, as is Landry's real preference.

The Laplante plan proposes a clearer path that would ask Quebecers to vote for a constitution marking the creation of an independent Quebec, free thereafter to sign various treaties with various countries, including Canada.

In the months leadin PQ convention of June 2 is what the real debate about. And this is where the leadership issue comes in.

Since Landry seems to remain leader, he must first survive the confidence vote he'll be submitted to next June. This means he must find ways to do that even though he voives strong opposition to the Laplante plan, which is increasingly popular among PQ members.

It will be fascinating to see how Landry will manoeuvre to protect his own vision and his leadership through it all. But one thing is certain: Landry must now explain how his traditional approach would ensure a more ambiguous referendum on sovereignty-partnership would be fought without Ottawa drowning Quebec in expensive propaganda and without its results, should it be won, being contested by Ottawa on the world stage using the Clarity Act.

Parizeau's approach other hand, ensures the process a double legitimacy, both here and abroad. First, the PQ gets elected on a clear mandate to trigger the process. Second, it holds a referendum on a constitution that would surely state Quebec will be an independant country.

If that isn't clarity, I don't know what is.

Just bear in mind that Josee Legault is a sovereignist so everything, and I mean everything, she says must be taken with a grain of salt, to say the least!