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An editorial discussing candidates' raison d'être and radio hosts' lament the campaign for being "monotonic." Ethnic media on Quebec's provincial election campaigns: Political careers...a matter of personal choice Montreal's Greek source Ta Nea published an editorial by Michalis Tellides: Cross-cultural translation: Lawn signs are popping up and many candidates hail from different countries. Canada is a country of immigrants and all of us whether directly or through our ancestry have come from somewhere else. It is always thought of as positive to see people from our ethnic community run in an election and we always wish them success. But we should keep our aims high, that those representing us are doing it for the right reasons and that they will do a great job of representing everyone in their riding. Political careers are great, as long as they come from a place of personal passion and not external factors or incentives. (08/09/2018) Electoral campaign in QuebecPortuguese radio show from Montreal Radio Centreveille 102.3 FM discussed:
Cross-cultural translation: The hosts commented on how Quebec’s provincial election campaign is monotonic. There is a lack of proposals or debate regarding the environment by either the CAQ - the leading party in the polls - or any other party. They talked about a recent survey by “Le Devoir” in which Quebecers showed a higher concern with the levels of immigration into the province than with global warming or the environment. The hosts mentioned the CAQ leader said he would reduce the number of immigrants from 50,000 to 40,000 a year, forgetting that there is a signed agreement with the federal government that stipulates the current numbers. They said he might not be aware of this agreement or he may be trying to trick voters in order to gather more votes. This and their proposal to make immigrants take French language tests after they have been in Québec for three years can encourage racism toward immigrants. (12/09/2018)
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Syrian Canadians mourn the loss of Marrisa Shen Chinese source 51.ca reports:
Cross-cultural translation: A statement reads: "The Syrian community in Canada join their fellow Canadians today in shock and condemnation of the despicable homicide of young Marrisa Shen. At this moment of sadness, we earnestly join all Canadians in mourning and hope that this terrible incident won't result in a backlash against refugees. The Syrian community in Vancouver will be lighting candles for Marrisa Shen this Friday at 9:30 a.m. at the Provincial Court of British Columbia in Vancouver, where the perpetrator is expected to appear before a judge." This statement was written in English and translated into French and Arabic. However, the translation into Chinese is missing, which resulted in great dissatisfaction among the internet users of the Chinese community. At the same time, the mention of a possible "backlash against refugees" makes Chinese internet users feel that the rally was not purely to mourn Shen. Also, some internet users think that holding the event outside the provincial court puts pressure on the judge. (12/09/2018) Multicultural reporting on this event highlights the conflict between different minority groups, not just minority groups and the mainstream. The murder has been reported on in mainstream media: by some as a defense of their anti-refugee sentiment, and others express the complicated natures of both migration and tragedy. MIREMS' mandate to make language barriers transparent brings stories from minority communities to the mainstream. By listening to multilingual and multicultural communities, Canadians can deepen their understanding of Canadian events. Who is right - Constitution, judge or Doug Ford? An editorial published by Toronto's Canadian Punjabi Post says:
Cross-cultural Translation: Superior Court Judge Edward Belobaba has rejected the Doug Ford government's Bill 5, saying that the bill was enacted in the middle of an ongoing election campaign and breached municipal candidates' freedom of expression. On the other hand, Premier Ford, in fighting back against the ruling on Council downsizing, has announced plans to invoke the province’s power to use Section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to trump a Superior Court decision. Section 33 is commonly known as the notwithstanding clause or the override power and allows Parliament or provincial legislatures to override certain portions of the Charter. This is the first time an Ontario government will employ this extraordinary tool in the Charter. However, the question is how Judge Belobaba called the reduction of seats a breach of freedom of expression. With Bill 5, only the number of City Councillors would have been reduced, and no part of the city would have remained without representation. So who is right: the judiciary or Doug Ford? If the Constitution has given the right of decision to the judge, it has also given Ford's majority government the right to reject the judge's decision. (11/09/2018) Ethnic media coverage of Toronto's council debate is as varied as council itself. Some have argued that the decrease in councillors will affect diverse representation in government, others side with Ford's decision as a way to cut costs in government. The issue has become a defining one early on in Ford's Provincial leadership.  On est désormais à la troisième semaine de l’élection québécoise. Depuis son début, celle-ci a généré une bonne couverture dans les médias ethniques, en particulier les médias qui servent les communautés arabes. Parmi ces médias, deux se distinguent, à savoir Sada Al Mashrek (Écho de l’Orient) de Montréal, bimensuel en langue arabe axé sur la communauté libanaise, et Atlas Montréal, autre bimensuel mais francophone qui s’adresse surtout à la communauté marocaine de la métropole québécoise.
Dans plusieurs éditoriaux, Sada Al Mashrek se penche sur la participation des personnes d’origine arabe dans la politique locale. Un article souligne que les électeurs d’origine arabe ont tendance à être inactifs lors des élections, mais cette tendance semble changer chez ceux qui sont nés ou qui ont grandi au Québec. Ces derniers sont politiquement plus conscients et disposés à exercer leurs droits de citoyens. Il cite l'exemple de deux candidats du Parti libéral du Québec, M. Mohammed Barhone et Mme Marwah Rizqy, tous les deux d’origine marocaine. Dans leur cas, leur candidature n'est pas un simple geste symbolique, car ils se présentent dans des circonscriptions où ils ont de bonnes chances d'être élus. Dans la même foulée, le journal met l’accent sur des questions spécifiquement québécoises, que les nouveaux arrivants pourraient avoir du mal à comprendre, mais qui pourraient toujours les toucher, notamment la peur existentielle d'une petite société francophone dans une Amérique du Nord anglophone. Un des collaborateurs du journal, Habib Zaarour, écrit que si l’indépendance ou la souveraineté ne sont pas à l’ordre du jour de cette campagne, c’est parce que leur substitut - la politique identitaire – a pris leur place. Par ailleurs, un autre article reconnaît que beaucoup tourne autour de différentes visions du Québec et de ce que la province doit faire pour préserver sa culture distincte dans un environnement de plus en plus multiculturel et dans un pays aussi vaste que le Canada. La question pour les communautés arabes est de savoir comment saisir tout cela tout en contribuant à l’avenir politique et économique du Québec. La couverture de l'autre journal, Atlas Montréal, se concentre sur des questions spécifiques, à savoir la place des femmes, les élections à date fixe et l'immigration. Le bimensuel constate par exemple que les femmes semblent avoir comblé un écart avec les hommes, du moins en matière de représentation puisque près de la moitié (45,7%) de tous les candidats sont des candidates, du jamais vu. Le journal attribue cette tendance au fait que les femmes sont mieux formées en général et que leur niveau d'études est aujourd'hui plus élevé que celui des hommes. Dans ce sens, elles représentent un capital humain de plus en plus convoité par les partis politiques. Parlant du processus électoral, le journal cite Marc-André Bodet, politologue à l'Université Laval, qui pense que les élections à date fixe comporteraient moins d’incertitude et d’arbitraire dans le processus électoral et plus d’avantages pour les partis d’opposition qui pourraient mieux se préparer à la compétition. Cependant, une date fixe signifierait aussi une longue campagne préélectorale et des annonces préélectorales par le gouvernement visant à favoriser le parti au pouvoir. Atlas Montréal a également couvert le premier débat non officiel des chefs de partis, tenu à l’Université Concordia de Montréal. La proposition de Legault de refuser la citoyenneté canadienne aux immigrants qui échouent au test de français a été l’un des thèmes qui ont fait chauffer conférenciers et auditoire. En défendant son point de vue, le chef de la CAQ, François Legault, a souligné que le PQ propose des tests de langue pour les immigrants avant leur arrivée dans la province. Au fur et à mesure que la campagne progresse, MIREMS continuera à suivre la couverture des élections par les médias ethniques et présentera leurs différentes perspectives.  Quebec’s election is now its third week. Since the start, it has generated substantial coverage in ethnic media, in particular among the media that cater to Arab communities. Two stand out, namely Montreal’s Sada Al Mashrek (Echo of the Orient), an Arabic bimonthly with a Lebanese focus, and Atlas Montréal, a French-language bimonthly centred on Montréal’s Moroccan community.
In a number of editorials, Sada Al Mashrek looked at the participation of people of Arab origin in the political process. One piece noted that voters of Arab background have tended to be inactive in elections, but that trend appears to be changing among those born or raised in Quebec who are more politically aware and willing to exercise their rights as citizens. It cites the example of two Quebec Liberal Party candidates, Mohammed Barhone and Marwah Rizqy, both from Morocco. In their cases, their candidacy is not mere tokenism because they are running in ridings where they have good a chance of getting elected. At the same time, the paper also focused on issues that are specific to Quebec, which newcomers might find hard to understand but might still affect them, like the ever-present existential fear of a small francophone society in English-speaking North America. One of the paper’s contributors, Habib Zaarour, writes that while independence or sovereignty is not on the agenda in this campaign, its surrogate—identity politics—is. Another article acknowledges that so much revolves around competing views of what Quebec is and what the province must do to preserve its unique culture in an increasingly multicultural environment in a huge country like Canada. The question for Arab communities is how they can grasp all this while contributing to Quebec’s political and economic future. The other paper, Atlas Montréal, focused on specific issues, namely gender, fixed date elections and immigration. It noted for example that women appear to have closed the gender gap, at least, in terms of representation since almost half (45.7%) of all candidates are women, a historic record, a trend, the paper attributes to the fact that women are better educated in general and better educated than men, hence attractive human capital for the various parties. Turning to the election as a process, the paper cited Laval University political scientist Marc-André Bodet, who believes that a fixed date means less uncertainty and arbitrariness in the electoral process and more advantages to opposition parties who can better prepare themselves. But a fixed date also means a long pre-election campaign and government pre-election announcements geared to favour the ruling party. Atlas-Montréal also covered the first unofficial leaders’ debate at Montreal’s Concordia University. One of the topics that saw sparks fly was Legault’s proposal to refuse Canadian citizenship to immigrants who fail to pass a French-language test. In defending his case, the CAQ leader François Legault noted that the PQ proposes language tests for immigrants before they come to the province. As the campaign unfolds, MIREMS will continue to monitor ethnic media for their coverage of the election and present the various ethnic perspectives in the matter. Written by Pierre Rossi Saudi students file for asylum in Canada as deadline to return home passes
Vietnamese source Thoi Bao from Toronto reports:
Cross-cultural translation: As the deadline for Saudi students to leave Canada passes, at least 20 students are filing asylum claims in an attempt to stay in the country. Saudi Arabia asked all its students to leave Canada, after Canada expressed concern in a Twitter post on August 3 over arrests of women's rights activists in Saudi Arabia.
Omar Abdulaziz, a prominent Montreal-based activist from Saudi Arabia, said he's working with the students, whose lives were disrupted in August after a diplomatic feud erupted between Saudi Arabia and Canada. Abdulaziz, 27, successfully filed for asylum in 2013 after he said he was threatened by the Saudi government because of his political activism. "They don't want to go back. Some of them are scared of what happened to me, and they think that if they go back they'll be arrested,” he said. More than 8,000 Saudi students in Canada had their lives upended in early August when they were told to pack their bags by the end of summer. The Saudi government has now said that around 1,000 medical trainees can stay until "an alternative assignment can be arranged." But that leaves little respite for many other students, some of whom have been living and studying in Canada for close to 10 years. Individuals can file asylum claims in Canada if they can prove that in their home country they'll face persecution on the basis of race, religion, political opinion, nationality or membership in a particular social group. Immigration lawyer Peter Edelmann said it's unclear whether defying the Saudi instructions to return would, on its own, constitute sufficient grounds for filing a claim, because the consequences that students will face are unknown. Edelmann said there are other ways that students may be able to remain in Canada. According to IRCC rules, because student visas are issued by Canada, students can stay, despite what the Saudi government may be telling them. Students remain eligible to study in Canada as long as their student permits are still valid. When full-time students graduate, they are typically eligible for work permits through a post-graduation program, and can then begin the process of applying for permanent residency through the government's Express Entry system. Abdulaziz is encouraging students to try to stay in Canada through other means, unless they fear for their personal safety.
(07/09/2018)
Canada's ethnic media has been a vital source of information for Saudi students as this situation has unfolded. Accessing important information in your mother tongue can make a great difference in how readers engage with that information.
MIREMS monitors ethnic media sources daily, working to make language barriers transparent by providing access to this vital information to Canada's decision-makers. NAFTA is back in the news thanks to recent remarks from President Donald Trump. Canada's ethnic media's reporting suggests caution should be taken; words like "risky" and "skeptically" run in headlines.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau knows the current phase of NAFTA talks is risky Italian source CFMB AM 1280 Italian Morning reports: Translated description: There is a risk for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in relying on a Republican-controlled Congress to block any North American trade deal that does not include Canada. Canadian media said that there is risk for Trudeau in counting on a Republican-controlled Congress. Despite their early words on the U.S.-Mexico deal, congressional Republicans do not have a long history of standing up to a president who is overwhelmingly popular with party voters. Trudeau said Canada will not sign onto a deal that does not include a dispute resolution mechanism and exemptions for cultural industries, two positions that were among the pillars of the original 1988 Canada-U.S. free trade deal. (05/09/2018) Canada skeptically returns to the NAFTA negotiating table Spanish source from Vancouver, Contacto Directo, reports: Translated Summary: Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland arrived in the US capital in an attempt to prevent Ottawa from being kept out of the trade agreement announced by US President Donald Trump and his Mexican counterpart Enrique Peña Nieto. (31/08/2018). NAFTA renegotiations Toronto's Caribbean source G 98.7 FM Mark & Jem in the Morning reports: Summary: Negotiators now have until October 1 to come up with a new NAFTA deal. Canada and the US need to present a text to US Congress by October 1. A failure of the negotiations could simply lead to a return to pre-NAFTA tariff levels or to significantly higher tariffs threatened by President Donald Trump in several sectors. (05/09/2018) Canada's multilingual and multicultural communities turn to media in their mother tongues to learn about Canada's international diplomacy. As NAFTA continues to be a source of tension, listening to diverse opinions and reporting on the issue will ensure leaders are prepared to make the best decisions they can.  The Diverstiy Empowers Cities Newsletter features top news stories from local ethnic media that matters. It's cross-culturally translated by MIREMS consultants across Canada, and works towards MIREMS' mandate to make language barriers transparent and ensuring diverse voices are part of the discourse. And also includes additional resources, commentary from Ontario and BC candidates and special coverage from MIREMS. View the latest issue online here. While the Multiculturalism Act was becoming law in 1988, MIREMS’ predecessor also first began working towards celebrating Canada’s diversity by making language barriers transparent. Now imbedded into the fabric of our national policy, multiculturalism has become an integral part of city development and growth. As cities and municipalities across the country gear up to elect new officials this fall, MIREMS is bringing the opinions and ideas shared by multicultural communities with their ethnic media to a larger audience.
These voices are present and powerful; they discuss municipal issues in their mother tongue. MIREMS’ careful cross-cultural translation makes them accessible. The Lower Mainland’s multilingual ethnic media are shining a spotlight on Surrey’s upcoming municipal elections. The media is closely following and reporting on candidates and municipal hot-topics. Their reports and opinions are circulating among ethnic communities in their mother tongues from Punjabi to Chinese.
According to the 2016 Census, 106,100 people in Surrey speak Punjabi as their mother tongue, accounting for around 20 percent of the city’s population, while 32,780 people reported a Chinese language as their mother tongue (6.3 percent), and 17,540 indicated Tagalog (3.4 percent). Almost half of Surrey residents speak neither English nor French as their first language. Media Waves, a 24/7 Surrey-based Internet radio station which caters to around 380,000 South Asians in Canada, recently broadcast a discussion about the upcoming Surrey elections on its morning talk show: Important questions remain unanswered as B.C. municipal elections approach Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Media Waves hosts conducted an elaborate discussion into the many issues that they believe all three major parties - Surrey First (Tom Gill), Surrey Integrity Now (Bruce Hayne) and Surrey Safe Coalition (Doug McCallum) - have neglected. When the average person from Metro Vancouver is asked "who will you choose for mayor", they often respond by saying that they don't really have many choices, which shows that they don't see any substantive differences between these candidates. Even council candidates remain distant, and fail to examine the problems individual councils face. A major clarification into how these council candidates are linked to real estate developers and the truck parking industry (which was linked to Tom Gill) was called for. Another very important question centered on the question of policing and options for reforming/replacing the RCMP. Doug McCallum, who has supported this proposal, has failed to "tell us why there is a need to bring in the municipal police, and where the RCMP have failed." Confusion surrounds how they will be trained and how simply introducing a municipal police force, which will replace the much better funded RCMP, would help in actual terms. Similarly, Bruce Hayne, who insists on finding out the cost of replacing the RCMP, was also criticized in the following terms: "Should this process not be the other way around - that we study how much the cost would be, and only then propose solutions?" Finally, Media Waves commented on the crime rates in Surrey and asked the candidates how, if at all, they were planning on working with the federal government on the issue of restricting access to handguns. (29/08218) Showcasing the priority issue of public safety, Filipino newspaper Philippine Asian News Today published an article on ending gang violence in Surrey: Mark Holland visits Surrey to support community efforts to end gang violence Community: Filipino Summary: “Parliamentary Secretary to the Public Safety Minister, Mark Holland, visited Surrey to hear community concerns and ideas from local experts on tackling gang and gun violence. Ensuring the safety of Surrey’s neighbourhoods is a top priority for Surrey’s Members of Parliament, John Aldag, Sukh Dhaliwal, Ken Hardie, Gordie Hogg and Randeep Sarai. This was the primary purpose of yesterday’s roundtable with Mark Holland, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Public Safety Minister. At this roundtable, the MP’s along with their provincial and municipal counterparts discussed the measures that have been taken to date, as well as new resources and supports that are required to boost prevention, intervention, and enforcement measures to tackle gun and gang violence in Surrey. Members from various community organizations, Surrey School Board, City of Surrey Gang Task Force, Surrey RCMP, CFSEU, and representatives from the Ministry of Children and Families were on hand to share the work that is being done to prevent children from entering gang life, and the tools and resources that are needed to support this work.” (06/08/2018) On a different note, Swaraj Radio 96.1 FM mentioned the dark side of social media in relation to the municipal elections: Social media, party switches, and the Surrey elections Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: As the municipal elections for Surrey draw closer, matters are getting dirty, especially on social media. On Twitter and Facebook you can find tons of pages and groups that criticize and take potshots at the opposing parties. To top it all, developers have taken to Twitter to talk about shady financial and political transactions. They then discussed the erosion of party credibility of any kind with politicians switching between groups and candidates. After Tom Gill (Surrey First) voiced support for a handgun ban, Councillor Dave Woods decided to join Bruce Hayne’s Integrity Now slate for the upcoming Oct. 20 election. On the other hand, former minister of state Brenda Locke and prominent businessman Mandeep Nagra joined the Safe Surrey Coalition, with Doug McCallum, as council candidates. (30/08/2018) Prominent Surrey-based South Asian radio station Red FM 93.1, which broadcasts primarily Punjabi and Hindi programming, frequently reports on local municipal politics and issues. People First Surrey announces mayoral candidate, third council hopeful Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Rajesh Jayaprakash, a technologist with Telus, is seeking the mayor’s chair and Paul Rusan is joining the team as a council candidate. People First Surrey calls itself a non-traditional party and is the one party who in the beginning said was influenced by India's Aam Aadmi Party (common man's party) and its leader Arwind Kejriwal. The slate’s 16-point platform is outlined on its website, peoplefirstsurrey.ca. On the other hand, Proudly Surrey has also announced a school trustee candidate. Kapil Goyal is running for trustee under the party’s banner. (31/08/2018) Proudly Surrey announces fourth school board candidate Language: Hindi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Businessman Kapil Goyal is seeking a seat on the Surrey Board of Education in the coming municipal election. Goyal said being in Proudly Surrey is an honour for him. Goyal came to Surrey in 2006 and is a member of some religious organizations. (31/08/2018) Ethnic media sources are a direct line to immigrant populations, providing often ignored and marginalized communities with a connection and a voice. MIREMS monitors ethnic media sources in over 25 languages, removing linguistic and cultural barriers so that non-English speaking communities can be heard, and offering insight into how and what they think about a range of social and political issues. Municipal governments make big decisions on issues that affect the daily lives of all British Columbians. Making sure that elected officials have access to diverse voices is essential to good and fair representation. Making language barriers transparent is part of MIREMS' mandate, which is why we're pleased to share our free newsletter, Diversity Empowers Cities, which showcases municipal matters from the ethnic media perspective like these Le premier ministre Philippe Couillard a dissous l'Assemblée nationale du Québec le 23 août. Ainsi, avec l’été qui s’achève, les élections générales québécoises du 1er octobre s’approchent. Aux grands titres des médias ethniques : le système politique de la province, les partis politiques, les chefs et leurs positions sur des questions clés, sans oublier les sondages.
En mettant l’accent sur le système politique, MIREMS a suivi quelque 18 médias multilingues et multiculturels pendant la première semaine de la campagne, du 23 au 30 août.
Le jour du scrutin, les électeurs québécois éliront 125 nouveaux membres de l'Assemblée nationale. Lorsque M. Couillard a déclenché l’élection, le Parti libéral du Québec avait 68 sièges ; le Parti québécois, 28 ; la Coalition avenir Québec, 21 ; et Québec solidaire, 3. Cinq sièges étaient occupés par des indépendants. Pagini Romanesti (roumain) a noté que les quatre partis représentés à l’Assemblée nationale ne sont pas les seuls sur le bulletin de vote. En tout, 21 partis sont enregistrés pour cette élection, du pro-pot au pro-USA. On retrouve ainsi le Parti culinaire du Québec, un parti autoproclamé « gastronocratique » ; le Parti Nul qui favorise l'abstention du vote ; le Parti 51, qui veut faire du Québec le 51e État américain ; Québec en marche, version québécoise de France en marche ; le Bloc Pot ; et l’anticapitaliste et anti-impérialiste Parti marxiste-léniniste du Québec. Atlas Montréal, un bimensuel francophone au service de la communautés arabe, a examiné de plus près le système des partis du Québec, se demandant si cette élection pourrait représenter un tournant dans l’histoire de la province. En notant les nombreuses défections en faveur de la CAQ, notamment du PQ, il cite le politologue Éric Montigny, de l’Université Laval, selon lequel le Québec pourrait être à la veille d’un changement politique majeur, en passant de la pluralité de partis d’aujourd’hui à un système bipartite plus traditionnel. Si cela se produit, le principal changement serait le remplacement du PQ par le CAQ en tant que deuxième principal parti de la province. Ainsi l'histoire se répéterait comme en 1935 avec la montée de l'Union nationale (qui avait remplacé le Parti conservateur) et en 1968, lorsque le PQ avait remplacé l'Union nationale. MIREMS suivra de près cette élection, car elle est suivie par les médias ethniques. Plus tard cette semaine, l’attention de MIREMS se portera sur la couverture des partis et des chefs politiques dans les médias ethniques, ainsi que sur les sondages et le vote multiethnique. De nos jours, écouter les voix multilingues et multiculturelles est une ressource indispensable pour les électeurs, les candidats et les experts. Written by Pierre Rossi Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard dissolved the province’s National Assembly on August 23. Now, the summer hiatus is coming to an and Quebec’s next general election is scheduled to happen on October 1. Making headlines in the ethnic media are the province's political system, parties and leaders on key issues, and polls among the ethnic media.
Looking at the political system, MIREMS has monitored some 18 multilingual and multicultural media outlets who been reporting on the election in the first week of the campaign, from August 23 to30.
On election day, Quebec voters will elect 125 new members of the National Assembly. When Couillard called the election, the Quebec Liberal party held 68 seats, the Parti Québécois had 28, the Coalition avenir Québec, 21, and Québec solidaire, three. Five MNAs were sitting as independents. Pagini Romanesti (Romanian) highlighted that the four parties represented in the National Assembly are not the only ones on the ballot. There are 21 parties registered for this election, from pro-pot to pro-USA. The Parti culinaire du Québec (Quebec Culinary Party), a self-styled “gastronocratic” party; Parti Nul (Dummy Party), a pro-abstention party; Parti 51, which wants Quebec to become the 51st US state; Québec en marche, a copy of France’s France en marche; the pro-marijuana Bloc Pot; and the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist Marxist-Leninist Party of Quebec. The Arab-French Atlas-Montréal took a more serious look at Quebec’s party system, wondering whether this election could be a turning point in the province’s history. It noted the many defections in favour of the CAQ, especially from the PQ. Citing political scientist Éric Montigny from Laval University who believes that Quebec might be on the cusp of a major political shift, from the existing plurality of parties to a more traditional two-party system. If this should happen, the main change will be the replacement of the PQ by the CAQ as the province’s second main party. History is known to repeat itself and this has happened twice before: in 1935 with the rise of the Union nationale (which replaced the Conservative Party) and in 1968 when the PQ replaced the Union nationale. MIREMS will be keeping a close eye on this election as it is covered in the ethnic media. Following later this week, MIREMS will discuss parties and leaders in the ethnic media, as well as polling and the multilingual and multicultural vote. Tapping into these multilingual and multicultural voices can be a vital resource to voters, candidates and observers alike. Written by Pierre Rossi A broadcast from Radio VOA Somali in Washington, DC highlights the achievements of Fartun Osman, a female athlete from Somalia who immigrated to the US and is now helping Muslim girls overcome cultural barriers and taboos to play sports. Athletics and sports are a great way to encourage newcomer integration and level the playing field for everyone. Beyond the individual health and social benefits of being part of a team, such activities boost inclusion, confidence and participation in society. Fartun Osman is making a valuable contribution to equal opportunity with her efforts in counteracting the under-representation of newcomers in sports and recreation activities. Somali-American girls gaining sports popularity by breaking some cultural taboos Translated Summary: "Fartun Osman was a national team player and track and field runner back in Somalia. She came to the US in 1996. She lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Now Fartun is coaching boys’ and girls’ soccer, basketball and track and field teams in Minnesota after she got licensed to coach these different sports. Since Fartun’s arrival, she has been working hard to take advantage of the athletic and sports opportunities in the US. She said: “I know it’s not difficult to integrate sports into your life, but when everything is new to you, it takes a while to understand all the resources available to you. It also takes a lot of time and effort to penetrate religious observations and cultural taboos of the society. It is also tough to deal with stereotyping issues. For example, some people believe that Muslim women can’t be good at sports, because they aren’t allowed to expose most of their bodies while in public, but fortunately, I was lucky to overcome many cultural barriers and restrictions to form soccer, basketball and track and field teams for Muslim girls in Minnesota.” In order to achieve her goals, Fartun has taken many courses on coaching soccer, basketball and track and field. She’s also learned how to cater specifically to the needs of Muslim girls, especially in the Somali community. At the moment, her teams have gained a lot of popularity after they won several state championships. She is proud of her team’s achievements, especially because they are the first Muslim team to win in the state of Minnesota." (26/08/2018) MIREMS is reading and watching the Canadian and US ethnic media in over 25 languages to bring the voices and opinions of diverse communities to decision makers, providing translated summaries in English which remove linguistic and cultural barriers.
An article from Toronto-based Russian website Torontovka.com Bill Blair tasked with leading talks on Safe Third Country Agreement with the U.S. Translated Summary: “Bill Blair, the new minister in charge of border security and organized crime, was tasked by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau with leading the file on irregular migration and examining whether Canada should ban handguns and assault weapons. In a mandate letter, the prime minister asks Blair to lead conversations with the United States on the Safe Third Country Agreement. Blair’s work will be supported by the departments of Public Safety, Immigration and Foreign Affairs. The Safe Third Country Agreement stipulates that asylum seekers are required to make their refugee claims in the first “safe” country in which they arrive – meaning those who come into Canada at an official land border crossing are sent back to make their claim in the U.S. Blair will work closely with Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland and Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen.” (28/08/2018) Torontovka.com is a daily Russian-language website based in Toronto which provides local, community, Canadian and world news. The source targets not just immigrants from Russia, but all Russian-speaking Canadians, including Ukrainians, Belarusians, and others.
Canada’s ethnic media are following the latest developments on immigration and the Safe Third Country Agreement. MIREMS enables cross-cultural communication on prominent social and political issues by providing translated summaries in English of the multilingual Canadian ethnic media’s news reports and opinions. The Lower Mainland’s multilingual ethnic media are shining a spotlight on Surrey’s upcoming municipal elections. The media is closely following and reporting on candidates and municipal hot-topics. Their reports and opinions are circulating among ethnic communities in their mother tongues from Punjabi to Chinese. According to the 2016 Census, 106,100 people in Surrey speak Punjabi as their mother tongue, accounting for around 20 percent of the city’s population, while 32,780 people reported a Chinese language as their mother tongue (6.3 percent), and 17,540 indicated Tagalog (3.4 percent). Almost half of Surrey residents speak neither English nor French as their first language. Media Waves, a 24/7 Surrey-based Internet radio station which caters to around 380,000 South Asians in Canada, recently broadcast a discussion about the upcoming Surrey elections on its morning talk show: Important questions remain unanswered as B.C. municipal elections approach Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Media Waves hosts conducted an elaborate discussion into the many issues that they believe all three major parties - Surrey First (Tom Gill), Surrey Integrity Now (Bruce Hayne) and Surrey Safe Coalition (Doug McCallum) - have neglected. When the average person from Metro Vancouver is asked "who will you choose for mayor", they often respond by saying that they don't really have many choices, which shows that they don't see any substantive differences between these candidates. Even council candidates remain distant, and fail to examine the problems individual councils face. A major clarification into how these council candidates are linked to real estate developers and the truck parking industry (which was linked to Tom Gill) was called for. Another very important question centered on the question of policing and optinos for reforming/replacing the RCMP. Doug McCallum, who has supported this proposal, has failed to "tell us why there is a need to bring in the municipal police, and where the RCMP have failed." Confusion surrounds how they will be trained and how simply introducing a municipal police force, which will replace the much better funded RCMP, would help in actual terms. Similarly, Bruce Hayne, who insists on finding out the cost of replacing the RCMP, was also criticized in the following terms: "Should this process not be the other way around - that we study how much the cost would be, and only then propose solutions?" Finally, Media Waves commented on the crime rates in Surrey and asked the candidates how, if at all, they were planning on working with the federal government on the issue of restricting access to handguns. (29/08218) Showcasing the priority issue of public safety, Filipino newspaper Philippine Asian News Today published an article on ending gang violence in Surrey: Mark Holland visits Surrey to support community efforts to end gang violence Community: Filipino Summary: “Parliamentary Secretary to the Public Safety Minister, Mark Holland, visited Surrey to hear community concerns and ideas from local experts on tackling gang and gun violence. Ensuring the safety of Surrey’s neighbourhoods is a top priority for Surrey’s Members of Parliament, John Aldag, Sukh Dhaliwal, Ken Hardie, Gordie Hogg and Randeep Sarai. This was the primary purpose of yesterday’s roundtable with Mark Holland, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Public Safety Minister. At this roundtable, the MP’s along with their provincial and municipal counterparts discussed the measures that have been taken to date, as well as new resources and supports that are required to boost prevention, intervention, and enforcement measures to tackle gun and gang violence in Surrey. Members from various community organizations, Surrey School Board, City of Surrey Gang Task Force, Surrey RCMP, CFSEU, and representatives from the Ministry of Children and Families were on hand to share the work that is being done to prevent children from entering gang life, and the tools and resources that are needed to support this work.” (06/08/2018) On a different note, Swaraj Radio 96.1 FM mentioned the dark side of social media in relation to the municipal elections: Social media, party switches, and the Surrey elections Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: As the municipal elections for Surrey draw closer, matters are getting dirty, especially on social media. On Twitter and Facebook you can find tons of pages and groups that criticize and take potshots at the opposing parties. To top it all, developers have taken to Twitter to talk about shady financial and political transactions. They then discussed the erosion of party credibility of any kind with politicians switching between groups and candidates. After Tom Gill (Surrey First) voiced support for a handgun ban, Councillor Dave Woods decided to join Bruce Hayne’s Integrity Now slate for the upcoming Oct. 20 election. On the other hand, former minister of state Brenda Locke and prominent businessman Mandeep Nagra joined the Safe Surrey Coalition, with Doug McCallum, as council candidates. (30/08/2018) Prominent Surrey-based South Asian radio station Red FM 93.1, which broadcasts primarily Punjabi and Hindi programming, frequently reports on local municipal politics and issues. People First Surrey announces mayoral candidate, third council hopeful Language: Punjabi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Rajesh Jayaprakash, a technologist with Telus, is seeking the mayor’s chair and Paul Rusan is joining the team as a council candidate. People First Surrey calls itself a non-traditional party and is the one party who in the beginning said was influenced by India's Aam Aadmi Party (common man's party) and its leader Arwind Kejriwal. The slate’s 16-point platform is outlined on its website, peoplefirstsurrey.ca. On the other hand, Proudly Surrey has also announced a school trustee candidate. Kapil Goyal is running for trustee under the party’s banner. (31/08/2018) Proudly Surrey announces fourth school board candidate Language: Hindi Cross-culturally translated Summary: Businessman Kapil Goyal is seeking a seat on the Surrey Board of Education in the coming municipal election. Goyal said being in Proudly Surrey is an honour for him. Goyal came to Surrey in 2006 and is a member of some religious organizations. (31/08/2018) Ethnic media sources are a direct line to immigrant populations, providing often ignored and marginalized communities with a connection and a voice. MIREMS monitors ethnic media sources in over 25 languages, removing linguistic and cultural barriers so that non-English speaking communities can be heard, and offering insight into how and what they think about a range of social and political issues. Municipal government makes big decisions on issues that affect the daily lives of all British Columbians. Making sure that elected officials have access to diverse voices is essential to good and fair representation. Making language barriers transparent is part of MIREMS' mandate, which is why we're pleased to share our free newsletter, Diversity Empowers Cities, which showcases municipal matters from the ethnic media perspective like these.
JoJo Quimpo as NPA Vancouver City Council candidate for upcoming municipal election
Or news about issues, such as: Poll: 84% blame foreign buyers for Metro Vancouver housing crunch
These stories affect the mind-set behind the diverse doors candidates will be knocking on during the campaign. MIREMS currently monitors 152 ethnic media sources in BC’s Lower Mainland, spanning 26 language groups, which include Chinese (Mandarin & Cantonese), Farsi, Filipino, German, Greek, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Jewish, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Russian, South Asian English, Spanish, Tamil, Ukrainian, Urdu, and Vietnamese among others.
In line with the City of Vancouver’s demographics MIREMS monitors 30 sources in Chinese, Mandarin and Cantonese, covering both Ming Pao Vancouver and Sing Tao Vancouver, the two leading Chinese newspapers in the region. Ming Pao Vancouver, with a weekly circulation of 277,500, is recognized as one of the most influential papers for Chinese professionals and business leaders in Western Canada. CHMB AM 1320 Cantonese, which has an audience of 49,000, is a content-rich program that targets the Cantonese community with the most recent local, national and international news of the day. Other top demographic groups in Vancouver include the East Indian and Filipino communities. Statistics Canada says Punjabi is the second largest “immigrant language” in Vancouver. Almost 100,000 Filipinos live in the city. A prominent local South Asian radio station, Red FM 93.1, which reaches an estimated audience of 170,000, contains programming in both Punjabi and Hindi. Its Punjabi morning program expresses public opinion on municipal, provincial and federal political news, as well as economic and social issues. The host, Harjinder Thind, conducts interviews with politicians from the municipal to federal level, health professionals, mortgage specialists, insurance and immigration experts and many others. But Harjinder Thind is not the only “hidden persuader” on the airwaves. Take the following: Achieving for Delta
MIREMS monitors ethnic media sources, removing linguistic and cultural barriers so that non-English speaking communities can be heard, and offering insight into how and what they think about a range of social and political issues. Stay tuned for our upcoming free newsletter, Diversity Empowers Cities, to be released after Labour Day. To subscribe, click here: |
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