Categories: Need to know

Alberta premier Ed Stelmach to step down

‘After 25 years of public service, I am not prepared to serve another full term as premier’

by macleans.ca on Tuesday, January 25, 2011 2:41pm - 8 Comments

Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach announced on Tuesday he will not run for re-election. In a blog post on a government website, Stelmach explained that “after 25 years of public service, I am not prepared to serve another full term as premier.” “Until I provide the formal notice of intent to resign,” Stelmach added, “I will continue to govern to fulfill commitments I made in the last general election.” Polls have shown a steady erosion in Stelmach’s popularity since he won the 2008 election in a landslide. He was due to run for re-election in March 2012, a general election that may now be postponed for up to a year. “That was my timetable and mine alone,” Stelmach wrote. ”My successor has the parliamentary authority to call an election anytime up to the constitutional deadline of March of 2013.”

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calgarian

People…cannot appreciate an honest, sincere person willing to SERVE the people of Alberta. The stress of all the criticism and hard work that goes with it is not worth it to any "decent" person; so that's why we wind up with the criminals & creeps who just don't give a damn. Calgary's Enmax CEO Gary Holden says he is not available for politics…he'll tell you all to just F**k off like Ralph did, and make you even happier than Ralph & Trudeau did!! Go for it you ungrateful pricks!

calgarian

Sorry meant to say Holden is available…he says he is considering politics, so there you go!
Thwim

Sure we can. But Ed was way the hell out of his depth. The guy's an intellectual lightweight, with the natural leadership abilities (and charisma) of a wet noodle. If he's willing to serve the people of Alberta, then by all means let him, but let him do it in a position more suited to his natural talents — back as a school trustee in a small town he was probably great.

As premier? We need something more.

Holly Stick

We may get Ted Morton who would be worse.

Healthcare Insider

Let's just hope when it is time to go to the polls everyone remembers the name "Dr. Raj Sherman" and what that hardworking conservative party did to try to discredit him when he stood up for the citizens of Alberta and tried to address our ailing healthcare system….they tried to have his medical license suspended, claiming he was mentally unstable….and he was a member of their own party. Goodbye Ed, take your friend Ron Liepert with you. Don't let the door hit you and the way out.
Libertarian

WILDROSE!!
Mandatory Jedi

Not surprising. One look at the dramatic decline in polling numbers for the PC's over the last few years it's a wonder Special Ed managed to avoid being deposed sooner.
Orson Bean

Ed leaving is absolutely the best thing to happen to the Alberta PC party in the last couple of years. Getting a new leader in there is really the only hope they have of fending off Wildrose, though it may be too late (cf. Mulroney being replaced by Kim Campbell — we all know how that one ended . . .).