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I know who I am voting for

Editor:

Editor:

I would like to express my dismay over your attempt to present a two page advertisement on proportional representation as if it was a news article to inform us about this issue, while in reality it is slanted attempt to discourage us from voting for proportional representation. Not once did your paper mention “advertisement”. But maybe such journalistic integrity is asking too much from a Black newspaper.

So who is paying for these advertisements?

At the bottom of the first page I discover the acronym ICBA. A Google search reveals the anti-union Construction Industry Association. That figures…

The bottom of the second full page ad lists FairReferendum.com. Turns out the front man for that mysterious group is Jim Shepard, former CEO of Canfor. Same guy who also was behind

“Concerned Citizens for British Columbia”, who championed the reelection of then Premier Christy Clark. No wonder they can afford to run full page ads in who knows how many BC newspapers, trying to pull the wool over our eyes.

They claim the referendum question is too complicated for us simple minds to understand.

Part A of the referendum asks us if we want to keep the current system or change to Proportional Representation. Nothing complicated there.

Part B lets us state a preference among three possible systems of Proportional Representation, if we so desire. Or not, if we don’t want to. Maybe all we care about is to get rid of the current system which allows a party to get 100 per cent of government, even if they only got 40% of the vote. You call that fair, Mr. Shepard of “Fair Referendum”? Personally, I greatly prefer Proportional Representation where every vote counts, and any one of the three PR options is better than the current “First Past The Post”. Point is, we don’t have to make an X in part B at all.

If I had any doubt before whether to vote for or against PR, now that I know that big money is trying to manipulate us into voting against PR, I will most certainly vote for it.

Thank you, Mr. Shepard, for helping me decide.

Egon Rapp

Editor’s note: As Mr. Rapp himself correctly points out several times in his letter, the two advertisements regarding the upcoming provincial referendum on how we vote are exactly that, advertisements.

Their presentation and design could in no way be interpreted as either a news story, an opinion piece or as a letter to the editor.