June 22, 2018
The one Iranian-born member of Ontario’s provincial legislature was ousted from office June 5 in an election that saw his Liberal Party trounced—but another Iranian-Canadian from the winning opposition Conservative Party won a seat in the adjoining constituency, by defeating yet another Iranian-Canadian!
Reza Moridi, who was born in Urumiyeh, had held his seat since 2007 and in recent years was a member of the provincial cabinet as minister of science, innovation and investment. With many parties running, he had never gotten half the votes in the Richmond Hill riding (as Canada calls an electoral district). He previously won three times with percentages of 47 percent or 48 percent.
But this year, he drew just 28 percent of the vote and was defeated by the Conservative Party candidate, Daisy Wai, who said she had put great effort into organizing the Chinese community and getting its people out to vote.
The riding is heavy with immigrants and the election showed it. Wai was born in China. Another of
Moridi’s opponents was born in the Dominican Republic and yet another in the Soviet Union. Only one of the five candidates was born in Canada and he was born in the Richmond Hill riding to immigrant parents from Italy. Richmond Hill is an inner suburb of Toronto.
But Moridi isn’t going away. In his speech conceding defeat at the Shiraz Restaurant, he announced his candidacy for the seat at the next election, due within four years. Moridi said the Liberals did a lot for the province, but complained that the Conservatives just talked about sex education and marijuana. “It was a very strange election. People voted with emotions and feelings, not thinking,” he said.”
Just north of Moridi’s riding is the riding of Aurora-Oak Ridges-Richmond Hill. And in that district, Conservative Michael Parsa, who was born in Tehran, coasted to victory over eight other candidates. Despite the large slate of candidates, Parsa pulled down a firm majority of 56 percent. Parsa, who came to Canada at the age of seven, said, “Never in my wildest dreams did I think a young immigrant to Canada would one day have the opportunity to run for office and be elected.”
Parsa oversees a family business that sells furniture and mattresses.
In second place, with 22 percent, was Liberal Naheed Yaqubian, a 28-year-old who was born in Canada to Iranian immigrants. She said, “I think we ran a fantastic campaign. Our volunteers were really energized. We brought a whole new generation of young people into politics, so I’m pleased about that.”
The election was a total disaster for the Liberal Party. It went from holding a majority of 55 seats in the legislature to just seven seats in an expanded body of 124 seats. And since the law only recognizes parties with eight seats, the Liberals no longer have official standing in the legislature.
The Conservatives, on the other hand, surged from 27 seats to 76 and party leader Doug Ford, a populist in the Trump mold, has become provincial premier.
Two Iranian-Canadians, Ali Ehsassi and Majid Jowhari, hold seats in the national parliament, both as Liberals, and another Iranian-Canadian, Amir Khadir, holds a seat in the Quebec provincial legislature, where he is one of just four members from the far left Quebec Solidaire party.
In the 2015 federal elections, Jowhari won his federal seat by defeating Parsa by 3-1/2 percentage points.