| 15:20 on November 18, 2003, EST. |
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Prime Minister Jean Chretien in the Prime Minister's office on Parliament Hill on Nov. 18. (CP/Tom Hanson) OTTAWA (CP) - Paul Martin will become the country's new prime minister on Dec. 12, turning the page on a decade of Jean Chretien rule. Chretien, finally bending after an overwhelming Liberal leadership victory by his longtime adversary, announced Tuesday that he will retire well ahead of his scheduled February departure. That clears the way for Martin to choose a new cabinet, open a fresh parliamentary session in the new year and prepare a budget in advance of a likely spring election. Martin said he will immediately begin work preparing to take over. "We've got to prepare now for the transfer of power and the first priority will be obviously to put together a cabinet and to set up the Prime Minister's Office," Martin said after meeting Chretien on Tuesday morning. The 40-minute huddle in Chretien's office was the first formal meeting between the pair since the former finance minister was ousted from cabinet last spring over a leadership fundraising disagreement. The two appeared onstage briefly together during last week's leadership convention in Toronto in a show of solidarity after Martin won 94 per cent of the delegate vote. Privy Council Clerk Alex Himelfarb will now work closely with Martin and his transition team to grant access to all departmental and cabinet briefing books and key government information, said Jim Munson, a Chretien spokesman. Munson said the mood between the two men during the meeting was "upbeat" and there was no tension. Afterward, Chretien dominated a brief news conference, taking almost all questions and ushering Martin away by the arm before he could answer a last query. Calling his former lieutenant a "backbencher," he said he hadn't met with him previously because "there was no business to transact between him and I." Chretien also joked about complaints from the Martin camp that the transition has been dragging on too long: "Some say that Paul was patient - my wife was even much more patient " The Dec. 12 retirement date will allow Chretien to travel to Nigeria early next month to attend a meeting of Commonwealth heads of state. Chretien emphasized he's still in charge of the country during that time. "If I make a commitment (in Nigeria) it's a commitment of the government," he said. "I am the prime minister until the day I'm no longer prime minister." The two men agreed that a bill to fast-track the sale of generic drugs to poor countries should be granted priority when the House of Commons resumes, likely in January. Two other bills also require attention: one to establish new electoral boundaries and another to establish an independent ethics commissioner, Munson said. Chretien said he abandoned his plan to stay on until February because he's achieved most of the agenda laid out in a throne speech last fall. Once he leaves office, he will not play any role beyond that of a quiet supporter of the new Liberal government, Chretien said. "I'll offer him my best wishes and good luck. I will observe from the sidelines," he said, standing beside Martin. "If he feels he wants to consult me, he knows my number." Chretien had been sending signals for some time that he didn't intend to stick to the February retirement target. Last week, he put an official end to his last parliamentary session, leaving a handful of key bills unpassed. Among them were measures to: - Add seven new seats to the House of Commons by April 1, including four in the West where Martin hopes to boost Liberal fortunes. - Outlaw human cloning but allow embryonic stem cell research, the latter move loudly opposed by right-to-life advocates. - Decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana, a proposal that sparked heated debate within the Liberal caucus. It will be up to Martin, when he outlines his own agenda in a throne speech opening the next session of Parliament in January to decide whether to resurrect those initiatives. Chretien started charting his course to retirement in August 2002 at a caucus meeting of Liberal MPs and senators in Chicoutimi, Que. He announced then he wouldn't lead the Liberals into a fourth election, but said he wanted to remain in office until February 2004 - a schedule that appeared to leave plenty of time for potential challengers to organize leadership runs against Martin. In the ensuing months, however, Industry Minister Allan Rock and Deputy Prime Minister John Manley abandoned their efforts. Former industry minister Brian Tobin had given up even earlier. Only Heritage Minister Sheila Copps stuck it out, and her campaign team proved no match for the organizational and fundraising skills of the Martin camp, garnering only six per cent of delegate vote. LOUISE ELLIOTT |
� The Canadian Press, 2003 |
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