Rathika Sitsabaiesan, Former NDP MP, Now Wants To Run For Ontario Liberals
OTTAWA — One of the federal NDP’s former rising stars has decided she wants to run for the provincial Liberals in Ontario.
Rathika Sitsabaiesan, the former NDP MP for the Toronto-area riding of Scarborough–Rouge River submitted her nomination papers to the Ontario Liberal Party this week, The Huffington Post has learned. She is seeking a seat in an upcoming byelection in Scarborough–Rouge River, vacant since longtime MPP Bas Balkissoon’s surprising resignation last month. The riding has been Liberal since its creation in 1999.Sitsabaiesan was defeated in the Oct. 19 federal election when the NDP was completely wiped out in Toronto. She came in third with 22 per cent support, 10,000 votes behind her Liberal rival, Shaun Chen, who won 48 per cent of the vote. The Conservative, Ravinder Malhi, came in second with 27 per cent.
The 34-year-old was only elected in 2011 under then NDP leader Jack Layton’s wave, winning what had originally been thought of as a safe Liberal seat. Born in Sri Lanka, Sitsabaiesan became the first parliamentarian of Tamil descent. She immigrated to Canada when she was five.
On March 28, she took to Facebook to thank her supporters and announce that she had taken a vacation, got some much needed rest and spent time with her family.
“I am now back home in Scarborough and ready to figure out and work toward the next step,” she wrote. No matter what, I will always love and work for the betterment of our communities, province, country and global society.”
Her page makes no mention of running for Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals; it features mostly election-style posts urging people to vote for the federal NDP.[/quote
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Full article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/04/21/rathika-sitsabaiesan-ontario-lib...
Has there been an explanation provided as to why she made the change?
She thinks the Liberals are the ticket to wonning and she likely was never a social democrat to begin with. You know like Ujjal Dosanjh.
Presumably we will get a statement from Rathika over the next few days laying out her future plans.
It will be interesting to find out whether this is her own idea, or whether Kathleen Wynne has a hand in this, like in the Glenn Thibeault crossing.
Everything I hear about the Ontario Liberals is dreadful. Wynne was supposed to be the Liberal that was clean yet everything I read about suggests they are crooks wasting or stealing gobs of money and yet they keep winning elections.
Does anyone have an explanation?
Well..., why do you vote for them?
The NDP is better off without her. Should the Tories pull ahead in the polls, I'm sure she'll turn around and run for them.
As far as I know, Pondering lives in Quebec, so she can't vote for the Ontario Liberals.
Curious that you picked Dosanjh out of the long list of NDP MPs who switched to Liberals. Just because they are both South Asian? Why not using Bob Rae as an example?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_politicians_who_have_swit...
I live in BC and was a member of the party when he became Premier. Ujjal has since insisted he was never a social democrat and was always really a Liberal. In BC federal politics he has been as nasty an anti-NDP partisan as you'll find in the Liberal party. I spent a dozen years actively working on Burnaby Douglas campaigns so he automatically comes top mind.
Bob Rae is someone from the Centre of the Universe who I don't have any personal history with.
Rathika Sitsabaiesan has a genuine history of being a progressive activist.
But, the Ontario and federal liberal parties have a long history of vacuuming up progressive activists to give the party a progressive veneer. The usual argument of Liberal apparatchiks is that "you can accomplish more fighting from inside of the government than from outside".
It works so often for the Liberal machine so why wouldn't they continue doing it?
Rathika Sitsabaiesan in her own words. Why she has decided to run for Kathleen Wynne's Liberals.
https://www.facebook.com/rathikaspage/posts/10153713696397695
Some long-time NDP stalwarts are responding to Rahtika FB posting
"You are definitely not the person I thought you were. I though you were in politics to serve others. Now you would serve Kathleen Wynne? What happened to you?"
- NDP strategist & op-ed writer Tom Parkin
"Rathika, you should have spoken with some school board trustees about the Liberals' record on education before basing your decision on this. And their so called 'free tuition'. Very disappointing."
- NDP President Marit Stiles
"A principled Liberal? Whom are you kidding. Go listen to Stephen Lewis speech at the NDP convention and learn something about Liberals and their principles."
- Janet Solberg, Stephen Lewis foundation
Exactly, and if I lived in Ontario I would vote NDP provincially unless there were a progressive party to vote for.
You would think that Horwath would be on the phone with Rathika the minute after Bas abruptly resigned. But I guess Wynne beat her to it. Unlike the Sudbury by-election, Rathika won't be appointed as the candidate. She has to fight for the nomination.
Gee. Just imagine if some of these NDP champions made critical comments about leaders or elected members of their own party.
I didn't think much of Rathika before, nor do I know. But wow, was she ever popular around these parts while she was still playing for the home team!
How sad this is.
That makes sense.
It's a long-term Liberal riding provincially, so there are probably other people interesting in running.
And perhaps Wynne doesn't want to be criticized for appointing another candidate so soon after Glenn Thibeault in Sudbury.
On paper Scarborough Rouge River looks promising for the NDP in a by-election, especially with the Wynne government at low ebb. The NDP placed a strong second in each of the last two general elections and Basilkoon' margin was probably inflated by a considerable local following dating back to his days at City Hall.
It has become a monotonous Liberal tactic to poach NDP politicians. Fortunately most of them have not prospered in their treachery.
With the NDP in the doldrums more or less across the country I would not be surprised to see more Liberal overtures.
Wynne's circle doubtless made the cynical calculation that they were in danger in the by-election and had to shuffle the deck. Rathika is now frozen out as an NDP candidate and is not even assured of winning the Liberal nomination.
It is unfortunate that Rathika can pretend to herself that such a cynical corrupt government as Wynne's is somehow progressive. I wonder where she stands on Hydro privatisation.
Once Rathika loses the Liberal nomination, given that she is now persona non grata in the NDP, i expect her to wind up as the Green party candidate.
PS: If the Liberals want her to be their candidate badly enough I'm sure Pat Sorbara can get on the phone right away with all other would be Liberal nomination candidates and offer them each lifelong government jobs in exchange for withdrawing their candidacies! What could possibly go wrong?
There's currently some very heavy flirtation of Notley by the federal Liberals.
Ridiculous. Who could think a western NDP premier would change teams? That's crazy talk.
I suspect she's running for the Liberal nomination because she was assured by senior Liberals that she'd get it and if she loses I'm sure she'll get a nice sinecure appointment from the Wynne government or maybe the feds.
She's made a statement claiming she's going to the Liberals because of "free tuition" (and not because she thinks she has a better shot of getting back her 6 figure salary as a Liberal candidate than as an NDPer).
She is the Premier of Alberta and the Liberals are the majority government of Canada - so of course she needs to work with the federal government and get as much aid and support from Ottawa as she can. The Liberal federal government has the power to make or break Notley's provincial government. The federal NDP is not all that relevant to her right now. The federal Liberals also need her right now because the fact that Alberta is now taking action on climate change is the only reason Canada can sign on to the Paris agreement with a straight face!
That being said, Rachel Notley is a hyperpartisan New Democrat and i suspect if you slashed her wrist she would bleed orange. She and her husband (who occasionally posts here) HATE Liberals.
Agreed with everything Stockholm has said. In addition Rachel Notley is scheduled to meet the entire Trudeau cabinet (to talk Pipelines) at their next retreat in Calgary on Sunday.
http://globalnews.ca/news/2658617/trudeau-and-notley-to-talk-pipelines-a...
You're right...that would be Ujjahly unlikely.
Right.
And I can't imagine a Schreyer being named an ambassador by a Trudeau.
Nor could an NDP doer become a Harper talker.
That's why a notly switch would be hotly contested.
Oh, they're all such people of intense conscience, dedication, and principle. Until $$$ is mentioned.