Landry: No more days of 'infamy'

Quebec should be a country in time for 2005 Summit of the Americas, youth wing told

PHILIP AUTHIER
Montreal Gazette Friday, April 05, 2002

Premier Bernard Landry has repeated his wish that Quebec become a sovereign country in time for the next Summit of the Americas in 2005.

With three by-elections looming, which means he has to get the hard-line Parti Québécois vote out, Landry used a speech to Parti Québécois-Bloc Québécois youth-wing fundraiser to talk up the sovereignty option.

He said Quebec youth should get involved with the cause so their children don't have to fight the same battles with Ottawa as their elders, adding he personally is anxious to see the day when the Quebec flag is raised in front of the United Nations headquarters in New York.

In that way, Quebec will never again experience the "infamy" of not being allowed to address world leaders as happened at last year's Summit of the Americas in Quebec City, he said.

"The battle for sovereignty is a perpetual battle," Landry said over the din of cocktail chatter in a room at the Société St. Jean Baptiste's headquarters on Sherbrooke St. West. "It must mobilize us constantly. The mobilization must be total and perpetual."

Landry's comments came just a week after he told a business crowd in east-end Montreal that sovereignty remains for him a long-term goal. Although he does not plan to stop talking about it in the meantime, he conceded people are not interested in the subject now.

Last night, Landry got a reminder from the PQ youth-wing president, Pascal Bérubé, to not give up the fight. In introducing Landry, Bérubé urged the premier and his cabinet ministers to talk about sovereignty "constantly," in all of their functions and especially before unconvinced audiences.

"Go a little farther," Bérubé urged them. "Let's be in a permanent referendum campaign."

Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe, on hand for the evening, told the crowd they cannot expect the rest of Canada to give Quebec sovereignty.

Quebecers, he said, have to make up their minds and go for it with gusto.

"It's not the fault of others if we do not do sovereignty," he said. "It's up to us to take the decision. We can't expect others to accept our plan if we don't give it to ourselves."

Landry, who noted he has been talking up the cause for 30 years before all his audiences, said it is refreshing to see young people involved in the "final phase," of the campaign.

He said the PQ has always talked about sovereignty, even in by-elections, and will go on.

"Yes, there will be a referendum," he said. "The people will decide. The next question is when? There will be a referendum when we are morally certain of winning.

"This moment should arrive as soon as possible. I would not want the nations of the Americas to meet once again without us. I would not like the infamy of the Quebec summit to reproduce itself and the next meeting, you know, is in Buenos Aires in 2005 and it would be good if we had a little time before to prepare for it so you know what's left to do."