MONTREAL—Standing in front of a packed crowd of young dyed-in-the-wool separatists, former Parti Quebecois premier Jacques Parizeau took aim at the current party leadership in Quebec City on Saturday.
Parizeau urged the members of the upstart Optional Nationale party to “not be afraid of their dream,” and predicted that after Quebec gains independence, constitutional guarantees protecting English would “disappear.”
An influential figure who nearly led Quebec to independence in 1995, Parizeau said the PQ government shouldn't shy away from using public funds to work toward independence. The PQ recently denied charges from the opposition that it was using bureaucrats to develop a strategy to achieve sovereignty.
With misty eyes in the audience as he spoke, an enraptured crowd of young delegates listened to Parizeau and described his presence as magic.
"For 15 years, I've heard successive leaders of the Parti Quebecois say, 'We will not use public funds to promote sovereignty,"' he said Saturday.
"Well, if you don't want to use public funds to promote sovereignty, why are you here?"
Jean-Martin Aussant, the leader of Option Nationale, also took issue with the PQ's position, calling it an "abdication of leadership."
Parizeau made the comments at a meeting for the fledgling, pro-independence party. The 82-year-old continues to build ties with the new party.
Option Nationale didn't win any seats in the last provincial election but promises a more aggressive pursuit of Quebec statehood.
This isn't the first time Parizeau has been critical of the PQ.
Last month, he called on Premier Pauline Marois to consider a policy of free tuition at Quebec universities, even though the government had ruled out that possibility.
With Parizeau delving into the nuts-and-bolts of independence—Montreal’s West Island would not be allowed to separate from an independent Quebec—Aussant also took aim at language politics.
“The historical English community of Quebec is 8 to 9 percent of the population and they receive more than 20-25 percent of the funding at the university level. What we're saying is that we have to correct that imbalance,” said Aussant.
As for Bill 14, the PQ’s controversial program to revamp the province’s language laws, Aussant said that the new law “doesn’t go far enough.”
During Quebec’s last provincial election, the fluently bilingual Aussant took the unprecedented step of selling independence to the province’s Anglophone population in English. Party spokeswoman Catherine Dorion continued that push on Saturday.
“Both Anglophones and Francophones share some of the same fears,” said Dorion. “The Anglo community of Quebec has an identity unlike any other Canadian identity. They don't want to disappear, they want to exist and they want to thrive. I understand that because I am a French Quebecer.”
Formed in 2011, the party’s members paid $40 each to attend Saturday’s congress in downtown Montreal. For the 8,000 members of Option Nationale, some of whom are high-profile defectors from the PQ, independence is a dream that won’t die any day soon.
