A new citizen-led group in Alberta spent the first day of their long weekend asking residents of Old Strathcona, “Do you agree that Alberta should remain in Canada?”
The group known as Forever Canadian gathered on Saturday to begin collecting signatures of legal Alberta voters who are against the separation of the province from Canada.
The ultimate goal of the petition is to urge the provincial government to include anti-separatism considerations in policy.
“Albertans are proud Canadians,” said John Lobe, who was out canvassing on Saturday. “The moment we originated [Forever Canadian], we literally were receiving hundreds of emails per day.”
Separatist sentiment emerged largely after the federal election in 2025. The Alberta Prosperity Project applied to put the question of whether or not Alberta should secede from Canada on the ballot.
As of Wednesday, chief electoral officer Gordon McClure has referred Alberta Prosperity Project’s application to a judge to see if it contravenes the Constitution.
Forever Canadian’s movement began when former Progressive Conservative Deputy Premier Thomas Lukaszuk applied with Elections Alberta to gather signatures across the province for a formal petition in response to the separatist movement.
Elections Alberta granted Lukaszuk’s request on Wednesday. The petition will run until Oct. 28. The group has three months to collect almost 300,000 signatures.
At the canvassing event on Saturday, a small group of dissenters with a banner that read, “Alberta Sovereignty Now!” sat across from people signing Forever Canadian’s petition.
“This is 100 per cent a foil to the loud and brash anti-separatist group. They do not speak for most Albertans,” Lukaszuk said in a release.
“This petition is an opportunity to prove that.”
Lukaszuk told CTV News Edmonton on Saturday that he was happy to see a turnout from “all political stripes.”
“This is not about politics. We may differ on policies and we can squabble over things, but when it comes to being proud of being Canadian, we’re all on the same team,” he said.
The petition requires 10 per cent of the total number of all eligible voters in the post-election day list of electors from the 2023 provincial election. That’s 293,967 signatures needed to present the petition to the legislature.
Lobe said the first day of canvassing has bolstered his faith in the movement.
“Premier Smith will have a decision to make. She either adopts this as a government overarching policy and does away with any separatist talk and gets rid of legislation like a Sovereignty Act, or she brings it to a referendum,” he said.
“And Albertans will tell her to stop this nonsense about separation.”
With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Dave Mitchell
Correction
A previous version of this story stated that Lukaszuk had applied to Elections Canada for the petition. It was actually Elections Alberta.
