A man has been accused of threatening MP Marwah Rizqy. The Liberal calls for security measures for elected officials.
• Also read: Chrystia Freeland reflects on the molestation episode
• Also read: MEPs must ensure their safety
• Also read: Election campaign 2022: Bulletproof jackets for politicians
“The tension, I can feel it, the world thinks that everything is beautiful in Quebec, no!” says Loose, MP for Saint-Laurent in an interview with our parliamentary office.
About ten days ago, an individual threatened him on social networks. He then called the city police station and even a colleague’s constituency office to announce his imminent death.
“I didn’t sleep for three nights,” says the eight-month-pregnant woman. She was entitled to a police escort for a day. “That’s when my knees started breaking. I said for the first time that if I don’t have an escort, I don’t want to (campaign) anymore,” she adds.
The man in question, Claude Delaney, is accused of criminally harassing MP Marwah Rizqy and repeatedly communicating with her via telecommunications. The crimes with which the man from Sorel is accused occurred between September 1, 2021 and August 25, according to the denunciation file that Le Journal was able to read. He pleaded not guilty and was released on conditions.
Doing politics in 2022 is now associated with threats and insults. Party leaders tend to benefit from important security measures, but non-ministerial MPs do not. According to Marwah Rizqy, it’s time to take care of this problem.
“This is our new reality. We’re really naïve in Canada for a G7 country to think it’s okay to have so many elected officials without protection, she said. In my case, people recognize me on the street, I don’t have a name that people can’t remember (…) Let’s line up our flutes and have security. It’s not that there haven’t already been cases in Quebec, there’s a lunatic who’s returned to the National Assembly, there’s been a political attack on Pauline Marois and there’s social tension, it’s pretty palpable.”
Since then, the Liberal Saint-Laurent MP has asked to be fitted with a “panic button” to feel safer.
In collaboration with Antoine Lacroix