Interference concerns cloud petition process

As the Alberta independence effort appears to be gaining steam, so too does concern over the integrity of the process and the prospect of interference by forces from outside the province.

Under Alberta law, the expense limit for a citizen initiative petition proponent — the person who is leading a petition effort — is $572,200. If expenses exceed $350,000, audited financial statements must be filed, showing how the money was spent.

Also under Alberta law, the maximum contribution a proponent can receive from any eligible person or organization is $4,600 during the official petition period. Eligible contributors include individuals ordinarily residing in Alberta, most Alberta corporations (other than those specifically prohibited by law), as well as Alberta trade unions or employee organizations. Contributions can be in monetary form and/or in the form of in-kind donations of goods or services.

Those legal facts are important to bear in mind, given the rise in allegations that non-Alberta residents, Americans in particular, are donating funds to boost the effort to have that province leave Canada and become an independent nation.

For those who have not been following the situation, a group known as the Alberta Prosperity Project is soliciting signatures to force a referendum on Alberta independence. They have 120 days, as of Jan. 2, to collect 177,732 signatures from eligible voters in order to force a province-wide referendum that would ask this question: “Do you agree that the Province of Alberta should cease to be a part of Canada to become an independent state?”

Over the past few days, there have been long lines of people all over the province, eagerly awaiting their chance to sign the petition. The apparent groundswell of support has caught many political observers by surprise, given that recent public opinion polls have found that support for Alberta separating from Canada is quite low among the province’s voters.

Just this week, Pollara Strategic Insights revealed that a poll conducted by that company last month found that just 19 per cent of the 1,000 Albertans surveyed would vote for separation, and that 75 per cent would vote against the idea.

Those numbers are generally consistent with the results of several other polls conducted over the past year, and yet there is the nagging concern among many that support for Alberta independence is higher than those polls indicated.

That concern may be rooted in the reality that the supporters of the petition effort appear to be better organized and financed than expected. That has given rise to widespread concerns on social media regarding how the movement is being financed and where all that money is specifically coming from.

It is easy to find social media posts in which allegations are made that out-of-province money is flowing into Alberta in support of the independence movement, and it is just as easy to find social media discussion threads in which numerous people from outside that province say they have donated to the separatist cause, or plan to.

Several of those posts include a link to what purports to be the Alberta Prosperity Project’s web page, but that website — which solicited donations and said those monies would be used for a number of purposes, including funding events across Alberta to discuss the province’s future and sovereignty and educating the public for a potential sovereignty referendum — is not currently functional.

Combine that reality with the fact that APP leaders have been meeting with U.S. government officials in order to advance their cause and seek support for Alberta separation — and that those discussions have reportedly included a request for a possible multibillion-dollar loan from the Americans to help Alberta transition to independence — and it is easy to understand why so many Canadians, both within and outside of Alberta, are growing increasingly anxious about the spectre of foreign manipulation of the referendum issue.

This is no trivial matter. The integrity, sovereignty and future of our nation is on the line. Albertans have the right to consider an independence petition and possible referendum, but all Canadians share an interest in the process being conducted in compliance with the applicable law, and free of foreign interference of any kind.

With that important fact in mind, we call upon both the Alberta and federal governments to continue to take all necessary steps in order to preserve and protect the integrity of the Alberta independence petition and referendum process.