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Mungall comes out in support of recently resigned James

Nelson Daily Editor
By Nelson Daily Editor
December 7th, 2010

By Timothy Schafer, The Nelson Daily

The city’s MLA has come out in support of the now resigned BC NDP party leader, one day after Carole James announced she could no longer keep the fractious party together.

Michelle Mungall, MLA for Nelson-Creston, extolled the way James rebuilt the party in the provincial legislature, taking them from two seats in 2003 to 35 seats in 2010.

When James stepped forward as leader of the party seven years ago, said Mungall, it was a difficult time in the party’s history.

“We had two seats in the BC Legislature and many people did not want to affiliate with us,” she said. “Yet, Carole’s dedication to the NDP was clear during the leadership race, and in the end she received broad support to be BCNDP’s leader.”

That support eroded over the weekend as months of infighting boiled over and many in the party became publicly critical of James’s approval ratings, which have long trailed far behind her party.

They also felt the party needed a new leader to renew it, following the recent resignation of Liberal Leader Gordon Campbell and the potential renewal of the Liberals under a new leader.

That prompted calls for her resignation last week by a group of 13 NDP MLAs led by Jenny Kwan, who lashed out at James in a public letter. Kwan called James “undemocratic” for the way she ran caucus meetings and demanded a leadership convention. 

In a brief press conference at 11 a.m. Monday morning at the legislature in Victoria, James said she felt she had become the excuse for infighting within the party, and wanted to remove that excuse so the NDP could concentrate on policy.

In stepping down as leader, James has again put her commitment to British Columbians first, said Mungall.

“It was not an easy decision, but it is one that she felt necessary to end the internal conflict within the BCNDP,” she said. “British Columbians wanted to see the fighting stop, and so she stopped it.”

The focus must now be on getting ready to make a government rooted in democratic principles and the values important to citizens, said Mungall.

editor@thenelsondaily.com

 

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