Kandahar Gov. Tooryalai Wesa (right), seen in February 2009, lived in Coquitlam, B.C., for 13 years. (Murray Brewster/Canadian Press)

The Afghan-Canadian governor of Kandahar province in the volatile south of Afghanistan survived an assassination attempt Friday, a local official said.

Gov. Tooryalai Wesa was on his way to a mosque in Kandahar city for prayers to mark the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.

A remote-control roadside bomb detonated as the governor's three-car convoy passed by in the centre of the city, said Zelmai Ayubi, a spokesman for Wesa.

Ayubi said the governor was unhurt, but his vehicle was damaged and one policeman was wounded.

Most of the roughly 2,800 Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan are stationed at Kandahar Airfield on the outskirts of the city.

Wesa grew up near Kandahar city. He served as Kandahar University's first president until he left the country in 1991 with his wife. He then served as an agricultural expert at the University of British Columbia. The couple have three children and lived in Coquitlam, B.C., for 13 years.

In December 2008, Wesa accepted Afghan President Hamid Karzai's offer to become governor of Kandahar.

The assassination attempt on Wesa came on the same day that Karzai called on militants and extremists to give up violence.

"From the Taliban, from Hezb-e-Islami and all our other brothers who stand armed against their country, I hope that for the peace, stability and development of their country, they come back to their homeland, their families," Karzai said.

Hezb-e-Islami is a militant Islamist faction led by warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.