There is also a rumour that Watts wants well-known Surrey Conservative Dr. Allison Patton to join the team as a replacement for Barinder Rasode, who also is expected to run for mayor. Last February I had written about how Patton, a naturopathic physician who co-founded the Mountainview Wellness Centre in Surrey and is well-known in the community, was contemplating to run for the Conservative nomination in South Surrey-White Rock. But rumours are that Hepner is pissed off at Watts for trying to bring in Patton. She wants her own candidate. Surrey First will also have to get a second candidate. I know of one candidate who snubbed them royally because of their rude, arrogant behaviour. Patton didn’t return my calls on Thursday – earlier, she always did so promptly. Hmmm, I wonder if the rumours are correct!
RAJ CHOUHAN CUTS A SORRY FIGURE: Why can’t politicians learn to keep their mouths shut sometimes – and thus save themselves a lot of grief, eh? NDP MLA Raj Chouhan, who is the Deputy Speaker, repaid $2,200 for his wife’s fare as he took her along with him on his South African trip to a parliamentary conference. He said he had asked Speaker Linda Reid about it and was told it was okay for him to take his wife along. Reid herself was forced to repay the $5,528.16 for her husband’s business class to the same conference after the media came to learn of it. Well, everything was kind of over with that controversy, until last weekend when Chouhan tried to appear so righteous by telling The Province newspaper’s Michael Smyth that he had asked three different legislature officials about the correctness of taking his wife at the taxpayers’ expense and was advised it was cool. Instead of garnering the sympathy he had apparently expected, he got hit by a flood of negative reaction by readers. One of them bluntly noted: “I couldn’t get past the feeling that he is simply being a political opportunist and attempting in his self-deprecation to cast guilt away from himself. In other words, he is already an adept politician.”
ANOTHER CRAZY WHITE RACIST IN CHILLIWACK TERRORIZES SOUTH ASIANS: Some time ago, a crazy white racist targeted a South Asian restaurant in Chilliwack, but the great residents of that city fully supported the South Asian owner and even organized a special event to encourage customers to go there. Now just a week after a raft of suspicious fires in Abbotsford, there were some in Chilliwack and CTV showed on Thursday night that two of the victims were South Asian homeowners. A security camera caught the image of what appeared to be a white man. It takes just one crazy racist to shake up a whole town. I am sure the great guys in Chilliwack will unite once again to tackle this idiot.
