Photograph by John Major/The Ottawa Citizen
Guergis appears determined to withstand Liberal charges that her Charlottetown freak-out constituted “disorderly conduct that could have put passenger safety at risk.” She is reputed in Ottawa to be a difficult boss and was near the top of the “Biggest Scrooge” category in the Hill Times’ most recent yearbook-style vote—the same one that, in the past, hung a “Laziest MP” label on Jaffer. But the Prime Minister may not feel compelled to move her. “She can be a little of a Pierre Poilievre in a skirt,” remarks one Conservative strategist: “Harper likes to have people around like that who are unflinching in their desire to savage all opponents.” The real power to dispose of Guergis’s career rests with the voters of Simcoe-Grey.
Jaffer’s path is less clear. In late 2008, he and a long-time friend, Patrick Glémaud, launched a company called Green Power Generation Corp. The privately held firm is based in Ottawa and acts as a developer for green power projects. Glémaud, a former environmental lawyer with the Department of Justice who worked on the Kyoto accord, says that Ontario’s Green Energy Act, which came into effect last year, has created attractive business opportunities by offering to pay top dollar for power created through solar and other green technologies.
He is short on specifics, but he says GPG has a couple of projects on the go, including plans to build a solar farm on 800 acres of land owned by himself and his wife near Bancroft, Ont., a town of about 4,000. (The solar farm is news to Bancroft’s mayor, Lloyd Churchill, who told Maclean’s he wasn’t aware of the project.) Glémaud says the company is also trying to set up projects in China using so-called “Dragon Power” technologies that harness kinetic energy from cars travelling over roadways or bridges. “Mr. Jaffer was in China three weeks ago discussing this matter, looking for potential investors and sites for development,” he says.
Jaffer brings business savvy and a politician’s people skills to the enterprise, according to Glémaud. “When you talk about renewable or any green technology, the problem isn’t the technology, the problem is having someone with a business mind who is able to execute the project and get them in the marketplace,” he says. “And that’s where Mr. Jaffer comes in. He is someone with a lot of business contacts within Canada and outside of Canada, and who had a business himself.” That business background may be somewhat limited, given that Jaffer has spent most of his adult life in politics. Although he is still associated indelibly with his old coffee shop, he and another business partner lost their Timothy’s franchise in 2004. Nonetheless, Glémaud regards his pal as a natural entrepreneur.
“In some ways, I think it was kind of a blessing that he was not re-elected, because I think he has more potential in the business sector than politics,” says Glémaud. “The business sector is based on merit. You work hard and you succeed. In politics, you can work hard and get nothing out of it, or you get attacked by the media and everything you do is looked at through a big magnifying glass.”
