The entire riding association for the BC NDP in the Fraser-Nicola riding resigned en masse over the naming of its candidate ahead of a potential fall election.
All 13 members walked out in protest over the process in which Aaron Sumexheltza was nominated as the candidate, with some members calling the process ‘undemocratic and corrupt’.
Appearing on the NL Morning News, the former Chief of the Lower Nicola Indian Band said he followed all the rules.
“My understanding is the party set the rules for the nomination process and I did my best to follow them and of course I wanted to be the candidate so if there’s any specific questions to the process I would suggest talking to the party about that,” he said.
“I wasn’t the one that made the rules but I think it would be important to talk to people at the party themselves and I’m just really excited to begin the work of earning the trust of people in the riding”
He was asked when the last time he spoke with the now former riding association president Harry Lali and vice president Dennis Adamson.
“I haven’t spoken to Dennis Adamson for a while and I have spoken to Harry. I’ve been involved with the local riding the last few years. I haven’t spoken to him recently but we have spoken over the last couple or few years,” Sumexheltza said.
“Harry was a very good MLA and I worked on his last campaign. I did what I could to try to get him elected and unfortunately the last two elections he didn’t win so this time I decided to put my name forward because I love the communities in Fraser-Nicola and I want to make them better.”
For his part, Harry Lali accused party president Craig Keating of undemocratically parachuting a candidate into the riding.
“There were several other people who were interested in running for the nomination but Craig Keating and Raj Sihota – the Executive Director of the BC NDP – again rigged it so that at the end of the day Aaron got appointed,” Lali told NL News.
“Now, he hasn’t done any work for the NDP in the last, forever actually, and he only became a New Democrat because Craig Keating wanted him to take me out and this is his payoff.”
Lali adds he is not turning his back on the party, just the party President and candidate Sumexheltza.
“I can only speak for myself and that is that I will not be supporting Aaron,” he added. “I will not be voting for him. I will not be giving any money to his campaign because I find him an illegitimate appointment as candidate.”
Instead Lali says he’ll be helping to keep John Horgan in the Premier’s office by working on outreach to the South Asian community in the Lower Mainland.
Keating meanwhile says the Fraser-Nicola Riding Association received multiple notifications that applications were being received dating back to July 12 – but only one application was submitted and approved – that of Aaron Sumexheltza
Despite the mass resignations from the party association, Sumexheltza feels he has plenty of support.
“Well I’ve been assembling a team for actually many weeks and months,” he said. “Since I made the announcement on Thursday and I was acclaimed as a candidate, I’ve had an overwhelming amount of people contact me and excited about my campaign.”
Lali lost the 2017 election to Liberal Jackie Tegart by just 524 votes.
– With files from Brett Mineer
