MONTREAL -- The Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ) has finally removed from its website partisan text praising its record following the commemoration for the 10,550 COVID-19 victims.
At the end of the day Tuesday, Premier Francois Legault admitted that the anonymous text entitled "Could another team have done better?" was "a bit boastful."
He claimed that was not his style, while defending his supporters' right to write such partisan texts saying, "Our party is better than the other party."
The CAQ, according to Legault, was no different from other political parties in this regard.
In its text, the CAQ answered its own question, stating that "according to the majority of the population and most analysts" another team could not have done better.
The text caused a lot of reaction, in particular because it was written alongside "the commemoration of the 10,500 deaths," according to the Parti Quebecois (PQ).
PQ leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon criticized the CAQ's arrogance, given that Quebec has half of the victims of COVID-19 in Canada, while it represents 23 per cent of its population.
At a Wednesday news briefing, the PQ welcomed the withdrawal of the text.
"It was indecent, and that we allowed such a letter, it says a lot about the state of mind of the government and an arrogance that continues to manifest itself," said PQ parliamentary leader Pascal Berube.
TEXT WAS NOT 'OUR TASTE'
Deputy Premier Genevieve Guilbault later explained that the text did not start with a bad intention, but that it did not reflect "the necessary humility that we must have."
"It wasn't quite to our taste as a text," she said.
Journalists asked her if she nevertheless agreed with the conclusions her party published. According to Guilbault, it is impossible to answer yes to this question.
"It's like saying that everything has been perfect in the last year," she said. "Of course not. There is never anything perfect. But we did our best, we did a lot of things."
She went on to once again dismiss the opposition's call for an independent public enquiry into the management of the pandemic.
For her part, CAQ director-general Brigitte Legault said the text was not withdrawn at the premier's request.
"The text of a supporter, which aimed mainly to highlight some of the achievements of members of the senior public service and some entrepreneurs, unfortunately gave the impression of a boast," she said. "We have decided to withdraw it, as it was not at all the intention.''
-- this report by The Canadian Press was first published March 17, 2021.
