Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall made the formal visit to the province's lieutenant-governor Monday to ask him to dissolve the legislature and issue the writ of election for Nov. 7. Roy Antal/Canadian PressSaskatchewan's general election campaign has officially begun.

As he promised to do last week, Premier Brad Wall paid a visit to the lieutenant governor on Monday to request that the legislature be dissolved, setting the stage for an election four weeks from now.

"It'll happen just like we promised four years ago. It'll happen on the 7th of November," Wall told a roomful of Saskatchewan Party supporters in Saskatoon just after 6 p.m. CST.

When the writ was dropped, the 58-seat legislature had 38 Saskatchewan Party members and 20 New Democrats.

The 28-day campaign will see Wall, 45, challenged by NDP Leader Dwain Lingenfelter, 62.Saskatchewan NDP leader Lingenfelter spent the earlier part of Monday knocking on doors and speaking with reporters. CBC

Lingenfelter spent Thanksgiving Monday enjoying a turkey dinner and doing a little door-knocking in Regina.

"We'll see how it goes, but my belief is, with the platform items we have and the hard work being done, we're going to be very competitive on Nov. 7," he told campaign workers.

Wall said the campaign will present voters with a clear choice.

"Do we want to keep Saskatchewan moving forward from a position of strength … or do we want to risk turning back to the past?" Wall said.

The election call was not a surprise, because after the Saskatchewan Party government was elected in 2007, it changed the law to set fixed election dates.