COLE HOGAN
Opinions Writer

Unless you are well versed — well, even slightly versed — in Canadian politics, you probably have no inkling as to who Bev Oda may be, or why you should care.

Bev Oda is a Conservative Member of Parliament and a member of the cabinet as the Minister for International Cooperation. Still not ringing any bells?

Oda has recently been the focus of much criticism and media attention for scribbling the word “not” onto the 2009 recommendation that Kairos, a church-funded development charity, be given $7 million dollars in funding. Although officials had already signed in favour of the recommendation, Bev Oda scrawled the now infamous “not” into the text, thereby denying Kairos federal funding.

Oda has stated that declining funding to Kairos was not politically motivated, but a decision made by her officials at the Canadian International Development Agency.

Last December in the House of Commons, MPs asked Bev who wrote the “not” on the document. At that time she claimed that she was unaware of who had written the “not.” But two weeks ago she admitted in the House of Commons that she had told someone to write “not” on the document, stating that it was meant to reflect her opposition to the funding.

But why would Oda oppose to the funding for Kairos? If the officials in her department had agreed to the funding, why would she, in such an odd and dramatic fashion, go against the majority opinion? Are there not proper channels to go through when these disagreements emerge? Is conduct of this sort amongst our government officials acceptable?

I cannot imagine an individual flippantly objecting to funding agreed upon by officials in her own department. What could possibly be gained by this decision, and if not for political reasons, what was the motivation behind it? Beyond who actually wrote “not,” who told Bev Oda to write “not”? Even further, what if someone told Bev Oda to tell someone to write “not”? Are you tired yet? This is not a matter of $7 million, or the legitimacy of Kairos. It is a matter of misleading the House of Commons and blatantly skirting accountability.

This reminds me of the ’80s electronic game Simon, which had four coloured buttons which flashed in a randomized sequence, after which the player had to reproduce that order by pressing the buttons.As the game increased in difficulty, the number of buttons to be pressed did as well.

Think of the Canadian public as Simon, and Bev Oda as the player in charge of pressing the right buttons. Despite being unable to correctly produce a single button in this sequence, Simon is allowing the player to continue. Why hasn’t Simon declared Game Over?

The ruling Conservative government has refused to release the costs of their corporate tax cuts and their justice legislation. They have also refused to answer MP order paper questions, blocked Access to Information requests and have refused to disclose any information regarding the perimeter security deal being negotiated with the United States.

This debacle is just another instance of our secretive, opaque, minority government at work.

House Speaker Peter Milliken said, “Any reasonable person confronted with what appears to have transpired would necessarily be extremely concerned, if not shocked, and might well begin to doubt the integrity of certain decision-making processes.” I can comfortably say that people are past the point of beginning to doubt the integrity of deliberation — or lack thereof — that we are seeing within the processes of government.

While attention has begun to intensify on the issue, Bev Oda has been hiding behind her fellow Conservative Members of Parliament in the House of Commons. After a recent eye surgery, Oda also took to wearing sunglasses in the House. Nothing says transparency like wearing dark sunglasses indoors.

The PM and John Baird have been unyielding in their support of Oda and her actions, while the opposition has called for Ms. Oda’s resignation, petition and all. The 23, 956 signatures on the petition suggest that Canadians are not forgetting about this issue, and I am certain this will continue to be an issue in Question Period after the break.

The parliamentary committee that Oda misled asked Speaker Milliken to judge whether she was in contempt of Parliament. The integrity of the Parliament has been questioned by the Prime Minister’s decision to keep Oda around and someone needs to be held accountable for these actions. Information needs to be disclosed.

The process that would lead to a decision on this issue could be lengthy and by the time a conclusion is reached, we could be at the polls. If this is the case, all we can hope is that Canadians are aware that the government in place has withheld information from Canadian citizens, condones misleading the House of Commons, and has acted without the best interests of Canadian citizens in mind.

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image: Flickr