General

Mulroney appears unsure about Harper

Former Conservative PM also dismisses coalition speculation “nonsense”

In an interview with TVOntario’s Steve Paikin, former prime minister Brian Mulroney expressed some unease with Stephen Harper. When asked whether he was voting for Harper, Mulroney said, pausing halfway through, “At this point, I’ll vote for the Conservative candidate in my constituency.” While he called Harper “a competent Prime Minister,” Mulroney gave the other party leaders more overt praise. He called Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff “an intelligent man, hard-working guy,” NDP Leader Jack Layton “an outstanding leader of his party,” and even mentioned that Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe is “respected in Quebec.” He also suggested that Ignatieff could win despite polls indicating that’s unlikely. “You never can tell what happens in political life,” he said. “I’ll tell you this, in 1984, when the campaign started I was 14 points behind. We ended up in a rather different fashion.” Mulroney may still be smarting from the aftermath of his business dealings with German lobbyist Karlheinz Schreiber, notes the Toronto Star. Schreiber is now in prison, serving an eight-year sentence for tax evasion.

Toronto Star

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