Referendum results prolong instability tors for each province, regardless of size. Its powers in relation to the parliament would be strengthened, especially in questions regarding the taxation of natural resources and electrical energy, and language. *
• November 9, 1992
CANADA a sovereign Québec, whose mission would include staking out majority English-speaking regions of the province as Canadian territory.
The ground work for the referendum was finally set by hurriedly passed legislation late in the summer, in the weeks preceding Charlottetown. This legislation, which spelled out
THE victory of the "no" side in the October 26 cross-country referendum on the constitution is a major defeat for the Canadian
Establishment.
Business leaders, the three main political parties, and a large majority of English-Canadian academic, media and political elites had supported the package of constitutional changes in the hope that its passage would put an end to the political instability that has plagued the country over the past two years.
RAGHU KRISHNAN - October 29, 1992
HE package of constitutional offers cing majority of voters in the western provinces and the majority
French-speaking province of Québec. It barely scraped by in the wealthiest and most populous province, Ontario, and was only accepted by a clear majority in three of the four small
Atlantic coast provinces and one of the two sparsely populated northern territories.
The Progressive Conservative (Tory)
government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney called the referendum in early September, after it had reached agreement with Canada's ten provincial leaders and one delegate each for Native Indian peoples living on reservations, those living off reservations, Inuit
("Eskimo") peoples and Métis (mixed aboriginal-European) peoples. The final five-day meeting which produced the constitutional offers took place in Charlottetown, capital city of the Atlantic coast province of Prince
Edward Island.
The over-riding consideration in Charlottetown for the government and its provincial counterparts was the need to head off the
Québec-only referendum on sovereignty that was to have taken place on October 26 according to legislation adopted by Québec's
National Assembly in the fall of 1990 after the failure of the Meech Lake Accord, the previous attempt to bring Québec back into the constitutional fold.
On this matter, at least, federal and provincial leaders speak with one voice - against the right of the Québécois, who make up about 25% of the total population, to freely decide their own political future; and for the preservation of a "united Canada" at all costs.
Indeed, the referendum was meant to be the culminating point of a vast cross-country federalist counter-offensive whose primary target has been "Québec separatists", whom Mulroney dubbed "the enemies of Canada".
This counter-offensive included a blitz of government-financed Canadian unity propaganda in the media and a mix of threats and dire forecasts regarding the economic consequences for both English-Canada and Québec in the event of Québec independence. The United States government even chimed in with its announcement that an independent Quebec would not be automatically admitted (NAFTA).!
There has even been serious talk of the eventual need for military intervention against the rules for the referendum outside Québec?, was noteworthy for its total absence of spending limits — clearly, the Tories wanted to ensure that its wealthy friends' support would not be hindered.
In Québec meanwhile, the staunchly antiindependence provincial head, Robert Bourassa, set about containing popular support for sovereignty — felt even inside his own Liberal Party. At first first he played to nationalist sentiments (temporarily suspending all public talks with other governments, calling the reterendum on sovereignty) but then postponed the referendum by a year, and finally agreed to replace it altogether with the pan-Canada referendum on the Charlottetown offers, which Québec had virtually no role in crafting.
However, it was clear that any attempt to close this particularly unstable chapter of Canadian political history would be fraught with difficulties.
First and foremost, because the national aspirations of the majority of Québécois have proven to be far more resilient than the Canadian Establishment had bargained for. Québécois support sovereignty
Polls conducted over the last two years have shown consistent majority support in Québec for "sovereignty", which some respondents define as outright independence and others see as a very high degree of autonomy within a radically overhauled Canadian Confederation. The three major union federations in Québec have taken pro-independence positions, and the main women's and student organizations have declared themselves in favour of sovereignty.
While 56% of Québécois voted "no", early analysıs shows the figure was much higher in
Highlights of the Charlottetown Accord • Québec Quebec would be granted a guaranteed 25% representation in the federal parliament and three of nine Supreme Court judges. It would be officially recognized as a "distinct society" within Canada "which includes a Frenchspeaking majority, a unique culture and a civil law tradition." • Aboriginal peoples The aboriginal peoples right to "self-government" would be entrenched in the constitution, establishing a third level of government similar to that of municipal administrations. The provisions for this new level of government would be negotiated with the different levels of government. If no agreement is reached after five years, it would be settled by the Supreme Court. No aboriginal law could be inconsistent with federal or provincial laws "that are essential to the peace, order and good government of Canada." • The Senate The Senate would become an elected body, with an equal number of sena14 International Viewpoint # 238 the francophone population, at 65% 85% of Québec's anglophones are said to have voted "yes".
The results are a big blow for Premier Bourassa and his Québec Liberal Party, though by no means fatal. Even while showing majority rejection of the Charlottetown Accord, polls taken during the referendum campaign showed the Liberals ahead of the Parti Québécois (PQ) by a few points. Provincial elections are to be held by 1994; Bourassa has confidently announced that he will make opposition to sovereignty the major issue of that campaign.
Indeed, in spite of the referendum setback, 1. A September 1992 Gallup poll showed opposition to NAFTA at 60%, up from the April level of 51%. The deal remains to be approved by parliament; the Tories will try and ram this through before calling an election. 2. In Québec, the referendum was conducted under its own, fairer legislation.
and Confederation of Regions Party, who were in the "no" camp.
In Québec, the Maoist Action Socialiste group called on its supporters to abstain in the vote, arguing that workers had no interest in Canadian or
November 9, 1992
Bourassa enjoys considerable room for manoeuvre. The PQ, led by Jacques Parizeau, which headed up the official "no" camp in the referendum campaign in Québec, hopes to ride the nationalist wave into power, without for all that presenting any clear plan or strategy for Québec's secession from the Confederation. Parizeau has declared the PQ's top priority to be the economy — which, given his party's abandonment of even its 1970s-era social democratic pretensions, is no cause for celebration.
Moreover, the traditionally militant Québec labour movement is passing through one of its quietest periods, a phenomenon not unrelated to the union bureaucracy's continued attachment to the PQ.
Of course, the Québécois people's national aspirations are not the only "problem" the Canadian Establishment has to contend with.
There is also that of growing radicalization among Canada's aboriginal peoples, particularly since the summer of 1990 standoff in Oka, Québec between armed members of the Mohawk Native Indian nation on one side and the Canadian Army and Québec provincial police on the other.
Some mainstream commentators have described the "no" victory as a terrible setback for Canada's aboriginal peoples. Indeed, Ovide Mercredi, leader of the Native Indian Assembly of First Nations (AFN) was present in Charlottetown and campaigned for the "yes" side, and has described the referendum results as yet another example of Canada's
However, the AFN itself, which represents 635 bands, refused to support the deal at its October 16 general meeting
Several Native Indian reservations across the country, including the Mohawk territories around Oka, simply refused to take part in the referendum and barred government elections officials from their lands. And the Native
Women's Association of Canada opposed the deal outright, arguing that it granted neither genuine self-determination nor the protection of women's rights guaranteed in the Canadian Charter of Rights.
There was a low turnout among aboriginal peoples on the reserves, and a majority voted "no". Inuit peoples, on the other hand, were the only national minority -along with Acadians (Atlantic Coast francophones) - to vote massively in favour of the Charlottetown
There is a clear disaffection among wide layers of aboriginals - both on the reserves and in the cities - with the "official" leadership, which AFN head Mercredi has come to
Finally, while the commanding heights of the "yes" camp would like to interpret the English-Canadian "no" vote as an exclusively anti-Québec, anti-aboriginal phenomenon, its true nature can be found elsewhere ly, in the unprecedented hatred of the Tory government and the disastrous consequences of its economic policies.
Official statistics place unemployment at 12%, and the real figure is at least a few percentage points higher. Canadian capital has undertaken a massive programme of restructuring and relocation in the framework of the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement, shedding tens of thousands of jobs, shutting down factories and slashing government spending across the country.
The Tory government has gone down in the record books as the most unpopular in Canadian history - even in the history of Western bourgeois democracy — having consistently hovered around the 12 to 15 percent mark in opinion polls for the two-year period following the failure of the Meech Lake Accord.
Mulroney has, however, done sterling service for the Canadian ruling class, legislating through the Free Trade Accord and the hated
CANADA Goods and Services Tax. But his greatest achievement, which may backfire, was having the Québec referendum on sovereignty cancelled - orchestrating a grand consensus of English-Canadian political elites at Charlottetown, including the leadership of the union-based New Democratic Party (NDP) and the majority of the union bureaucracy.
The NDP was actually on a huge upswing in the immediate post-Meech period, winning a series of provincial elections. For a time, the party even was ahead in polls on federal voting intentions.
Now, the NDP has been dragged down with all the other backers of the Charlottetown Accord. As a result of this - and the three NDP provincial governments' implementation of an austerity agenda - the NDP found itself back in its traditional spot behind the Tories and the Liberals, and only marginally ahead of the rightwing populist Reform Party.
### Reform Party chauvinism
The Reform Party, which combines antiQuébec and anti-francophone chauvinism with western regionalism and xenophobic themes, campaigned actively for the "no" side - as did the even more openly bigoted Confederations of Regions Party in the Atlantic region. Without a doubt, their message has struck a chord, and their electoral fortunes are sure to increase as a result.
However, organized English-Canadian opposition to the Charlottetown Accord was not restricted to the populist rightwing. The women's movement, organized in the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC), set up progressive "no" committees in Vancouver, Edmonton and Toronto
They were joined by mostly women activists from the anti-racist, labourt, and gay and lesbian rights movements, who argued that a "yes" vote would entrench their under-representation in the country's institutions, and place further obstacles in the way of progressive social legislation. An association of envi-
Where the Left stood nal in the Canadian State, campaigned for a "feminist and working class no" vote in the October 26 referendum.
In English-Canada, they joined the "no" committees initiated by the National Action Committee on the Status of Women in Vancouver, Edmonton and Toronto.
In Québec, members joined the leftwing, pro-independence "no" campaign initiated by the magazine Vie Ouvrière (Worker's Life) and the Montréal-based coalition of social movement activists, FRAPRU. This campaign was conducted outside that of the official "no" camp led by the Parti Québécois.
The Canadian Tribune newspaper, voice of the majority which left the Communist Party of Canada (CPC), took no position, printing articles critical of the Accord alongside the union bureaucracy's call for a "yes" vote.
The International Socialists, Canadian sister organization of the British Socialist Workers Party called for a "yes" vote in the referendum. They argued that the Accord should be supported based on the "extremely modest concessions" it made to aboriginal peoples and Québec. They stres sed the importance of voting against the rightwing populist Reform Party Québec nationalism. * ronmental groups opposed the Accord, highlighting the absence of provisions for environmental protection. NAC also played a key role in the pre-Charlottetown period, successfully fighting, for example, to keep a proposed clause on the inviolability of private property rights out of any eventual agreement.
As in Québec, it is not yet clear what impact the "no" victory will have on the struggles of working people in English-Canada. If the advocates of a progressive "no", in English-Canada as in Québec, can continue to pursue common work and exchanges into the post-referendum period, they could provide a valuable leftwing pole of attraction in the coming months of growing instability - with all the opportunities and dangers this instability is sure to present. * 3. A substantial majority of Canadians want Mulroney to resign or call an immediate election. 4. The traditionally militant 50, 000 member Canaunion to take a "no" position - based on a clear 15 dian Union of Postal Workers was the only major defense of Québec's right to self-determination.
The Serbian
International Viewpoint # 238 • November 9, 1992 the imposition of the embargo and the start of Operation Desert Storm.
It is not possible to find Chetniks with grenades around their waist. They have been banned from the streets for several months. The "new Yugoslavia" officially has "nothing more to do" with the war in neighbouring Croatia and Bosnia.
In the middle of the Terazije, the main prime minister and president of the rump "Yugoslav