Hardial Bains
August 15, 1939 – August 24, 1997

Interview with Hardial Bains

– Canadian Public Affairs Channel, April 2, 1997 –

The Canadian Public Affairs Channel (CPAC) conducted an interview with Comrade Hardial Bains on April 2, 1997. The interview, entitled Communism in Canada, was moderated by Dan Fonda who asked pertinent questions on the minds of Canadians at that time.

Two years prior, on January 1, 1995, on behalf of CPC(M-L) Hardial Bains launched the Party’s nation-building Historic Initiative whose aim is to lead the working class to take up its own independent politics in defence of the rights of all and vest sovereignty in the people who must be able to control the decisions which affect their lives. At the heart of the Historic Initiative is the Party’s work for the democratic renewal of the political process which Comrade Bains addresses in the interview.

Comrade Bains used the opportunity to elaborate essential aspects of the work for democratic renewal such as the demand for Canadians to participate in a meaningful way by themselves being able to select candidates who stand for election. In the absence of this, any theory of representation is devoid of true meaning. In the interview, Hardial Bains elaborates the Party’s slogan No Election Without Selection with a spirited critique of the archaic and anachronistic electoral and political process and how it not only marginalizes the people from exercising control over the direction of the society, but thrives on keeping people politically disengaged.

Comrade Bains passed away from cancer barely four months after this interview was first aired. It was then aired repeatedly for the 10 days following his death as people across the country mourned his passing at a crucial time in the political life of the country as it entered the new millennium.

The elaboration of the program discussed by Comrade Bains in the interview is even more relevant today at a time the crisis of the system of cartel party rule called representative government has deepened giving rise to a situation where not only MPs but the Parliament itself are treated as irrelevant to the decision-making process.

[BACK]