Today folks from the Campaign to De-Elect David Emerson walked all over Prime Minister Stephen Harper's attempt to ignore the continuing call from Canadians for David Emerson to resign and run in a by-election.

While the PM attended a tightly scripted event at a community centre in Burnaby, complete with a teleprompter and imported supporters, volunteers from our campaign made sure that Harper and the assembled press heard our message: By-Election Now!

Answering the inevitable questions from reporters on the Harper-Emerson affair, the Prime Minister again contemptuously dismissed his critics, calling us 'the same 10 faces'. Previously Harper has labelled opposition to his unprincipled decision as "superficial", later he labelled critics as "partisans". Neither attempts to deflect attention away from his own role in the sordid affair have worked, so now he's attempting to portray opposition as limited in scope. The PM couldn't be more wrong.

Following the event we issued a press release to national media providing the uninformed Prime Minister with some important facts - part of that release reads as follows:

Mr. Harper choses to avoid the uncomfortable truth because his numbers don't add up. Recognizing that the Prime Minister is a busy man, in order to help him with his math we've provided this handy fact sheet:

• 46,168 voters cast a ballot in the last election;
• 0 got what they voted for;
• 2 men, Stephen Harper and David Emerson, changed the outcome of the election and neither of them live in the riding.

Emerson has lost his mandate to represent our riding, and was never given a mandate from the people to govern. 37,489 (81.2%) people in this riding voted for candidates representing parties other than the Conservative Party.

Since this issue broke on February 6th, Canadians have come together like never before - just look at the numbers:

• Now 10 weeks into this issue, Canadians are still talking about the Emerson affair.


• Dozens of protests involving thousands of Canadians have been held.


• Over the past five weeks almost 1,000 "De-Elect David Emerson" lawn signs have sprung up on lawns all over Vancouver-Kingsway, the greater Vancouver area, and across Canada.


• 20,689 Canadians have 'signed' an on-line petition calling on Emerson to resign.


• On April 2nd almost one thousand Canadians marched in a "Walk for Democracy" down Kingsway to demand that Emerson resign and run in a by-election.


• Thousands of Canadians have registered on-line to keep informed and abreast of the issue


• Ipsos Reid, in a February poll of BC electors, indicated that 3 of 4 voters, even in strongly Conservative-leaning areas of the province, favoured a by-election for Vancouver-Kingsway. That's some 1,370,022 of the 1,826,696 BC voters in the last election who would like to see Emerson run in a by-election.

Even the Prime Minister can't ignore hundreds of thousands or millions of Canadians forever.

The De-Elect David Emerson Campaign pledges to carry on the fight for real democracy in Canada. We call upon the Prime Minister to do the right thing -- "stand up for Canada" and require David Emerson resign from cabinet, caucus and parliament, and run again as a Conservative in Vancouver-Kingsway in a by-election to be called promptly.

Maybe Mr. Harper could find the energy to add a sixth priority to his list of five? Start showing some respect for Canadian voters and our democracy.

Since news of today's protest hit the airwaves, sign requests have increased dramatically. If you'd like to plant a De-Elect David Emerson sign on your lawn or your apartment window, click here to sign up!