The new Wexit Saskatchewan party is quickly preparing for its first election coming up this October. The party’s interim leader, Jake Wall says he is excited as prospective candidates for the permanent job step forward and they gear up for their first ever convention..“I’m getting calls from people saying, ‘Listen, I want to help buy some memberships. What can I do? So the numbers are starting to pick up.”.If Wexit Saskatchewan has grown quickly, it’s because the party had little choice. On January 23, the Saskatchewan Party and NDP both agreed to change the requirements for new political parties to be established. It meant that Wexit had to collect 2,500 signatures by March 26 – much sooner than the fall deadline the party expected..As it was, Wexit handed in 3,599 signatures on March 10, becoming just the seventh registered party in Saskatchewan..Harry Frank estimates that he collected 500 of those signatures in 70 hours of work, canvassing Regina, Moose Jaw, Pilot Butte, and Balgonie..“The response was overwhelming,” Frank said. “Trudeau got in again and you saw what happened. Things just exploded.”.Frank said the decision of establishment parties to make it more difficult for Wexit to gain status only made people even more eager to add their name..“Our party is young but it’s growing,” Wall says. “We will definitely be a force in October come the election date. I know the Sask Party is worried about us.”.Wall says Wexit is picking up disillusioned voters from across the political spectrum..“We’re getting people who are disgusted with the NDP because they have gone so far left – probably 20 per cent of people who contact us. Those who had leaned towards Sask Party but don’t like [Premier] Moe would comprise of about 50 or 60 per cent. And then others who have never voted before would be the last 20 per cent of those people.”.Wall says Moe has lost support because of high debt levels, the expenses of putting transgender bathrooms in schools, and the shut down of the provincial bus company. .Another controversy arose when the emergency wards of 12 rural hospitals were shut down for weeks due to the pandemic. The premise was to make physical changes to the facilities and to train staff on protocols. Some felt the closures were made too quickly, were poorly communicated, and left people an hour from a hospital if they needed help. The Facebook group, “Citizens concerned about rural health care” was formed in response and now has 2,300 members..Wall says Moe and his Saskatchewan Party refused to let the people vote on whether they supported Saskatchewan independence, and were clearly warned that if they refused, Wexit supporters would form a party.. Wexit Saskatchewan .“Why do you think Moe doesn’t want to have the plebiscite? He doesn’t want to hear the answer. If the answer comes back, 75 to 80 per cent of people want to have a [binding independence] referendum – he doesn’t want to hear that answer.”.“But we know and you know and so does everybody that reads this article, Ottawa will never respond to those demands, because if they did they’d be foolish. When you own the keys and get the gas given to you, you don’t give away the car.”.Wexit has sent out candidate application forms as people step forward to become candidates. Harry Frank wants to be one, as does Constance Maffenbeier, a former RCMP officer who ranches between Humboldt and Watrous..“We’re just being so treated unfair[ly] you know. We’re just like the ugly stepsister,” Maffenbeier says of how Ottawa treats the West. .“Even if we do have a different federal party in there, they’re never going to give the West the representation that they deserve. So this is one way that maybe we can wake the East up as to how exactly how important Western Canada is to confederation and Canada.”.The party will be reviewing the applications for the potential candidates and hammer out its policies in July during its inaugural convention. The party will also pick its first permanent leader to carry the its banner into the election coming a few months later. .“I hear this all the time,” Wall says, “’You’re going to split the vote.’ Even if we did split half of the Sask Party vote, they have 51 seats. That’d mean one of us would have 26, one would have 25, the NDP would have 10. But we’ve got so many educated voters, I don’t think they’re even going to get 10.”.Wall hopes the party will run a full slate of candidates and get 30 per cent of the vote. .“We don’t have any seats at this point. So our goal at this point is to have our voice in Regina, and maybe make Ottawa stand up and take notice. And also to show that the western separation movement is alive and well and growing.” .Lee Harding is the Saskatchewan Affairs Columnist for the Western Standard. He is also a Research Fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy and is the former Saskatchewan Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
