LETTER

LETTRE

 Passing of Louis Lang

 

I wish to inform your readers of a death that is relevant to the Outaouais and the Pontiac riding's modern history.  I learned of it just now from a friend who often visits here.  The man's name is Louis Lang, and he ran for the Pontiac in provincial and federal elections in 1998, 1991, 2000, 2012, 2014 and 2018 (at least). Believe it or not (you didn't notice on your ballot?) Mr Lang ran each time for the Marxist-Leninist Party of Quebec, and that is the very reason so few of us have not heard of him or of his death.  Our media considers any sort of Communist candidate as something to hide, given our nation's neighbourhood.
    I remember Mr Lang speaking in Campbell's Bay in the MRC Pontiac in the last provincial election, when he was running against a full slate of the old-line parties -- Mr Lang was by far the most eloquent and straight-talking than all of the others, bar none.  He did not try to avoid or talk around specific questions but spoke clearly on the need for a new way of thinking and a new way of governing our province and country in the interests of the working and middle-class people, not the corporate spokespeople we usually elect. I spoke to him after that meeting, and ended up voting for him, not because I expected a win but as my protest vote.  Rather than blockade downtown Ottawa "for liberty", Lang represented a true alternative, not one from China or elsewhere, but one adapted to the realities of our society, where Indigenous, poor and working class, especially the gig-workers, could be represented on their own terms.
    In one of those elections, Mr Lang actually swept a single poll in Waltham!  Not that the village of Waltham is full of communists, but that they realize something different had to be done, and not just more "politics of gesture".  I hope someone will replace him, as articulate and intelligent as was Mr Lang.
    He was born in Hungary but came to Canada with his parents, who were both survivors of the Holocaust.  His mother actually survived Auschwitz.  He became a biologist after attending McGill, but years later joined the Canada Post, where he served for about 30 years, becoming head of the union there and leading one of the most important strikes in Canadian modern history. He lived in Aylmer, and died of cancer in his mid-sixties last November. It is a shame on Pontiac democrats that his life passed with so little recognition and support, but it is entirely understandable, since our schools and media have no commitment to sharing knowledge about any political possibilities which run counter to our corporate democracy where 30% of the vote gives full power .... so much for popular democracy!  And thanks to Louis Lang for carrying that message so faithfully!
John Bessell
Allumette Island (Pontiac MRC)