Alberta Liberal leadership hopefuls make last push for new members
Last Updated: Friday, November 7, 2008 | 11:12 AM MT
CBC News
Friday is the last day for anyone who wants to vote in the Alberta Liberal leadership race to buy a party membership.
Liberals will pick a successor to Kevin Taft using a mail-in ballot next month. Running are Calgary MLA Dave Taylor, Calgary MLA David Swann and former Edmonton MLA Mo Elsalhy.
The party has nine MLAs in the provincial legislature, is about $500,000 in debt and had only 4,000 members when the leadership campaign started.
Each of the three contenders paid $10,000 to enter the race, an amount that will cover the administration costs of the leadership process.
Mount Royal College political scientist Duane Bratt said he doesn't think the race is really about who sells the most new memberships.
"Really what they need to do is choose a new leader as quickly and as least expensively as possible, and then that new leader's got the job of rebuilding this party brick by brick."
The three candidates in the race made their final pitches to sign up new members in Calgary on Thursday night to a crowd of about 50 people.
