Achi news desk-
A special meeting has been called to discuss whether Franco-Ontarian Liberal MP Francis Drouin should resign as president of the Canadian branch of the Assemblée parlementaire de la Francophonie (APF).
“We are going to table a motion asking members to vote for Mr. Drouin’s resignation,” Quebec Bloc MP René Wilmore, one of the two vice-presidents of the Canadian branch of the APF, confirmed to The Canadian Press on Friday.
Wilmore, along with 16 other Quebec Bloc members, signed a letter requesting the meeting.
They say they don’t accept Drouin’s “very qualified” apology Thursday for calling two people “full of –” and “extremists” over a campaign to protect the French language in Quebec.
Three days earlier, the two men, an independent researcher and a CEGEP professor, explained that based on Statistics Canada data, when a francophone or allophone attends an English-speaking university or CEGEP, it significantly increases the likelihood that they will continue to live life in English.
Drouin replied and asked them if they really believed “that the big Anglicization problem in Quebec is McGill and Dawson College.”
Draon later apologized for not creating a “respectful environment” and using profanity but added that “the depth of his thinking remains unchanged.”
Villemure claims that Drouin continues to deny the “facts” and “trivialize” the fate of the French-speaking community in the province.
He says it’s “unacceptable, period” for someone he describes as “Canada’s first elected diplomat” in the affairs of the French-speaking world.
After apologizing, Drouin told reporters, “I’ve said everything I had to say” when asked if he intended to resign.
Wilmore said he was “astounded” by the need to ask for a vote, and urged Derouyan to accept the “only possible verdict” by retiring on his own.
“It’s better than removing it,” he said.
Both Bloc Quebec and Conservative Party of Canada leaders Yves Francois Blanchet and Pierre Pouillet rose in the House of Commons to call for Drouin’s resignation from the APF.
However, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his ministers continued to defend Drouin, noting that he had apologized.
In a written statement, the New Democratic Party’s official language critic Nicky Ashton said Friday that she “finds it hard to see” how Drouin can remain president of the APF’s Canadian branch “after disrespecting people and treating them in this way.”
The constitution of the Canadian section of the APF states that “any senator or member of parliament” can be part of the organization.
They don’t have to speak French.
The Parliament of Canada’s page dedicated to the organization shows that it had 88 members as of Friday morning.
A calculation by the Canadian Press reveals that 48.9 percent are members of the Bloc Quebecois or the Conservative Party.
MPs can become members up to seven days before the special sitting is due to take place.
Villemure noted that five members have already been added since the beginning of the week.
On Thursday, a message was sent in French and English indicating that the special meeting was scheduled for Thursday, May 23 at 6:30 p.m.
— This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on May 10, 2024.
