A Commentary from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper
“Leadership is not waiting for others to act.”
I received that great line in the form of a comment I received this September from Niagara, Ontario resident Dick Halverson – a great citizen activist in the region who I first met when he was helping to found the Niagara chapter of Habitat for Humanity some two decades ago.
Canadian citizen and journalist Mohamed Fahmy
Dick Halverson used that line in a brief congratulatory note to Town of Pelham Mayor Dave Augustyn and his council for launching their own public transit service for the community.
Of course the line can also be used for many of the issues being debated in Canada’s current federal election, including health care, climate change and the Harper government’s grossly poor response to the Syrian refugee crisis unfolding overseas.
Another issue the line can very well apply to is Harper’s continued refusal to make a direct phone call to the president of Egypt to demand the release of Canadian citizen and journalist Mohamed Fahmy who was recently sentenced to three years in jail their on completely bogus charges.
Now, more than a week after the sentencing and calls from everyone from Fahmy’s lawyers to Canada’s other federal party leaders and countless thousands of citizens across the country, more than 300 prominent Canadians have sent an open letter to Harper urging him to directly intervene.
Those who signed the letter which attempt to remind Harper, at one point, that “it goes to the very heart of what it means to be Canadian that we defend the rule of law and protect our fellow citizens from harm,”include Jim Cuddy from the band Blue Rodeo, comedian and television program host Rick Mercer, lawyer Clayton Ruby, scientist and broadcaster David Suzuki, CBC radio broadcaster Shelagh Rogers, internationally renown writer John Ralston Saul and former Canadian UN ambassador Stephen Lewis.
“The world knows that Mr. Fahmy is an innocent man trapped in a political nightmare (and) that he is in prison simply for doing his job,” says the open letter to Harper. “The world also knows that the conditions of Egypt’s notorious Tora prison pose a grave danger to Mr. Fahmy’s safety and health.”
Like a zoo animal, Mohamed Fahmy is packed into an Egyptian jail like this while Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper fiddles.
“We urge you, as Canada’s Prime Minister,” concludes the letter, “to communicate directly with (Egyptian) President al-Sissi the need to have Mr. Fahmy returned home safely and swiftly.”
“It is an absolute disgrace, not to mention an embarrassment in the eyes of the civilized world that a Canadian prime minister has to be approached in a letter like this – simply to urge him to do the obvious right thing on behalf of a citizen of his own country, in peril in another country.
Since Fahmy’s sentencing, all we have gotten from Harper’s office is that he has apparently sent the Egyptian president a letter on Fahmy’s behalf, but he won’t share the letter’s contents. It’s far from the first time Harper has insulted our intelligence on a bet that we will simply accept whatever he shovels us and move on.
Earlier this year, an Australian journalist was facing the same fate as Fahmy but he was finally deported by the Egyptian government and is now safely home because Australia’s prime minister picked up the phone and directly intervened.
I know I am going to anger some by writing this but I have been coming to the conclusion for a while now that the reason Harper won’t do much to help certain individuals or groups, including those Canadian Greenpeace activists Alexandre Paul and Paul Ruzycki (who were locked in a Russian jail for months two years ago before finally being let go), or the Syrian refugees or Mahomed Fahmy, has more to do with blind ideology and bigotry than almost anything else.
Environmentalists, members of the Harper clan have been quoted saying, are ‘a threat to Canada’s national interests’, and people of Arab descent, save for a token few Harper will do a photo op with, don’t rate much either, especially those who also happen to be Muslims. In the case of Fahmy, he has the added misfortune of being a journalist, and hasn’t been much of a secret in Ottawa circles for a long time now how Harper feels about journalists.
Whatever the reasons for Harper not acting swifty and decisively on the Mohamed Fahmy and Syrian refugees files, Canadian voters should not hesitate to do so this coming October 19th when we finally have the opportunity to throw his government out of office.
You can read the entire open letter to Harper and the list of names underneath it by clicking on – https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/freefahmy/pages/1/attachments/original/1441702872/LT_PM_Harper_-_Mohamed_Fahmy_-__Sep_8_2015.pdf?1441702872 .
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