The West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky riding may witness a hostile campaign even before Liberals are pitted against Conservatives.
The Conservative riding association recently announced that four candidate nomination meetings are tentatively set for Jan. 4, 5, 6 and 7.
The announcement may ramp up campaigns reflecting apparent friction between the candidate on record John Weston and the only other candidate, David Thomas.
In an October Chief article, the men sparred over divisiveness held over from the 2004 merging of the Progressive Conservative and Alliance parties in creating the Conservative Party.
Weston rejected any notion that he may represent only a faction within the party in his nomination campaign launch held in Whistler on Nov. 8. The event involved former PC Minister of Fisheries John Fraser, whom Weston credits with "ushering" him into politics after serving as his riding secretary.
"In this nomination campaign I'm representing various backgrounds of the party," he said.
Nonetheless, animosity between the men appears to be escalating.
On Tuesday (Nov. 14), Weston said that potential nomination candidates can submit applications until Nov. 29, but added "I don't know of any other candidates yet" despite the riding association web site naming Weston and Thomas as the official candidates.
Thomas questioned Weston's credibility for what appears to be his refusal to acknowledge that another candidate is vying for the chance to represent the riding.
"The John Weston campaign strategy has been to act as if there hasn't been a nomination race," said Thomas. "People have called me who were approached by Weston volunteers pressing for support and they say 'What about the other guy?' and they [volunteers] go 'Oh I think he dropped out of the race. I'm not sure he's even in the race'. It's a credibility thing at the end of the day. I mean there is a nomination contest on, might as well face that and get on with it rather than pretend it isn't."
Thomas balked at Weston's campaign launch, saying he launched his own campaign on June 24.
Weston's most recent visit to Squamish occurred on Tuesday (Nov. 14) and Thomas met with residents on Saturday, Nov. 4.
