At least 600 people took to central Edmonton on Saturday to swarm a Unity Bus that has, in recent months, become the cross-province symbol of pro-Canada movements in response to Alberta separatist sentiment.
The group was headed to the opening of the official Forever Canadian campaign office, the headquarters of continued efforts to prepare Albertans for an upcoming fall referendum that will ask voters if the province should remain part of Canada.
Thomas Lukaszuk, the vocal proponent who, alongside his team, amassed some 400,000 signatures for a pro-federalist petition, didn’t expect such a turnout.
“It’s a good problem to have. We need more sandwiches,” he told CTV News Edmonton on Saturday.
His group previously vowed to remobilize alongside the Association canadienne-française de l’Alberta for a bilingual take on a sign-up campaign after successfully completing a citizen-led petition earlier this year.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced a 10th referendum question this week that will ask voters if they’d like to stay in Canada, or if they’d like the government to hold another referendum on separation.
The move has seen criticism from both sides of the separation debate; Stay Free Alberta, the group that petitioned for an independence referendum question before being blocked by a Court of King’s Bench ruling, accused Smith of avoiding a real vote.
On the other side, federalists who watched the Forever Canadian petition undergo a legislative committee review, said the approval of a pro-Canada question was warped to include separatist sentiment.
Smith, in turn, said her government wanted to hear from the combined 700,000 Albertans who, in one way or another, signed a petition about the province’s fate.
On Saturday, while standing in front of the same “Unity Bus” he used while collecting signatures for his Forever Canadian petition, Lukaszuk disagreed with Smith’s comments.
“The fact is that the people collected signatures and signed the Forever Canadian petition to prevent a referendum from happening because we knew that separatists were going to file,” he said.
“Thousands of people can attest to the fact, frankly, they don’t want a referendum. It’s being hoisted upon us. We didn’t ask for this but since the premier wants a referendum we will be there and we will vote.”
Open to working with Conservatives
Lukaszuk also said he is open to working with Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who said this week all Conservative MPs will press for Alberta to vote to stay in Canada.
“This campaign will have many other smaller campaigns, and theirs will be one of them,” Lukaszuk said.
“As long as we’re all rowing in the same direction, and as long it is about Alberta staying in Canada, I will gladly work with anybody.”
Saturday’s event was also attended by Eleanor Olszewski, the Liberal federal minister responsible for prairies economic development and the representative for Edmonton Centre.
She said Prime Minister Mark Carney ran on a platform to unite Canada and will continue to do so.
"I grew up in southern Alberta in Medicine Hat," she told the crowd.
“I raised my family here, built my career here and I continue to live here. To this day, my identity as an Albertan is completely wrapped up with my identity as a Canadian. No one should be telling us that we have to make a decision about those two aspects of who we are. These are trying times.”
Lukaszuk theorizes the turnout is in part thanks to renewed patriotic vigour.
“It’s about pride. A love of this country … This is about dignity. This is about loyalty to our country, and that is being threatened right now,” he said.
Participants in the new campaign will disperse through the province in the coming months ahead of the Oct. 19 vote.
Stay Free Alberta has filed an appeal of the court ruling that struck down its nearly completed petition.
Smith’s UCP government has also filed an appeal, but has said the process could take months to years if referred to the Supreme Court of Canada.
With files from The Canadian Press
