Barry Coulter
The 29-day provincial election campaign is underway, with the dropping of the writ today, Tuesday, April 11.
And there is a third candidate in the riding of East Kootenay. Keith Komar of Cranbrook has entered the campaign, carrying the flag for the Liberatarian Party, which advocates for individual liberty, free markets, civil rights, low taxes, and limited government.
“We believe in economic and social freedom,” Komar told the Townsman. “The freedom from taxation is the same as the freedom of same sex marriages. We get a bad rap because we are accused of wanting to take over so we can burn it all down and walk away. That is definitely not the case for the BC Libertarian Party.”
Kumar, a bricklayer by trade and a single father of two, was motivated to throw his hat into the ring through great dissatisfaction with the two main B.C. parties (and the only two up to now in Kootenay East).
“To be honest, I needed someone to vote for,” Komar said. “I mean don’t get me wrong here. I love Tom Shypitka. I was at the Brier in Hamilton. I have the medallion somewhere. If he were running for any other political ideology, even as an independent, I would vote for him. But I cannot vote for the Liberals. There’s been too much scandal and back door dealings and we need that to end. And I cannot vote for the NDP. Their record speaks for itself. So the only other option became running for office myself, and the Libertarians are where my ideologies align.”
The BC Libertarian Party first ran candidates in the 1986 provincial election. This time, the Libertarians are fielding their biggest ever slate, with 30 candidates across the province, according to www.libertarian.bc.ca.
“We have several strong local candidates like myself who are well spoken and pragmatic in approach.,” Komar said. “We hope that people will see the effort we are making to balance freedoms with the State.”
The main plank of Komar’s campaign is Cannabis legalization.
“Whoever wins this election will be in charge on rolling out how the province handles the retail end of things and I would hate to see a huge economic opportunity lost in the Craft Cannabis industry,” he said.
“Ultimately, our whole platform is about choice. Choice in Education, choice in Healthcare, choice in your insurance providers. People are smart enough to make their own choices and the cost of administrating the nanny state is stifling us.”
