Wildrose apologizes for blog post blaming victims, socialism for Holodomor

EDMONTON – Alberta’s Opposition Wildrose party has apologized for suggesting the enforced starvation of millions Ukrainian farmers in the 1930s happened because they lacked incentive to work and grow food.

Wildrose member Dave Hanson said Monday he is proud of his Ukrainian heritage and criticized a blog post from last week that he and eight other members of the Wildrose caucus signed.

“This was wrong and I speak for all members involved (that) we apologize unreservedly for this post,” Hanson told the legislature.

“For any political party to try and push an agenda or at attack using the tragedy of the Ukrainian people and the Holodomor is deplorable.”

The other parties also made statements in the house and didn’t spare the criticism.

“To suggest the Holodomor was somehow the fault of the victims is shocking in its inaccuracy and disrespect,” said Richard Starke of the Progressive Conservatives.

“To make that suggestion for political gain is heinous.”

Erin Babcock of the NDP said the “sad episode is a reminder to all of us of the impact of what we say or write.”

Babcock said the sincerity of the Wildrose apology “will be judged on their future actions and whether they have learned anything from putting such bizarre, hurtful, and simply wrong comments on the public record.”

Wildrose house leader Nathan Cooper, asked by reporters aboutvetting for blog posts, said: “We always have appropriate checks and balances in place.”

He declined to say how the Holodomor post got through or whether party leader Brian Jean signed off on it.

The blog post was intended as criticism of Alberta’s proposed carbon tax. It’s to take effect Jan. 1 and will increase the cost of gasoline along with home and business heating bills as an incentive to reduce people’s carbon footprint.

More than 60 per cent of Albertans — those in middle- and lower-income brackets — are to receive a partial or full rebate. That has prompted questions about the plan’s effectiveness.

The blog post attacked the carbon tax by questioning incentives generally under a socialist system. To underscore their point, the nine Wildrose members pointed to the Holodomor in the 1930s and suggested the enforced collectivization of farms removed the incentive for millions of Ukrainian farmers to feed themselves and their families.

“History has shown us that the socialist collectivist mentality has failed over and over again,” said the blog.

That lack of incentive in Ukraine, it noted, resulted “in the starvation of nearly six million people that lived on some of the most fertile land on the planet.”

In fact, the Holodomor was genocide perpetrated by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin as a way to bring a resistant Ukraine to heel as he moved to collectivize Ukrainian farms to sell wheat for tools and machines necessary to modernize the economy.

There are an estimated 300,000 Albertans of Ukrainian descent.

The carbon levy bill is the last piece of legislation that needs to be approved before the house rises.

Opposition members are putting up multiple amendments, saying there needs to be more clarity and transparency on how the tax will be implemented and how the revenue is to be spent.