As had been expected NDP candidate Sarah Jama was an easy winner of the Hamilton Centre byelection called to replace Mayor Andrea Horwath. When the votes were counted, Jama had captured 54 percent of the votes with just under 22 percent of eligible voters participating.
At her victory party, Jama was flanked by NDP leader Marit Stiles, who had voiced support for Jama even after some controversy arose over numerous anti-Israel, anti-police postings that were on Jama’s social media platforms. The postings were all deleted in the final days of the campaign. Following a meeting between leader Stiles and the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, Jama issued an apology writing: “There issues are complex and my poor choice of words in the video that has been circulating have not helped. I apologize for my comments which have been harmful. This was never my intention, but I recognize the impact.” Later in the message she pledged to “speak out against antisemitism.”
The apology did not satisfy the Canadian B’Nai Brith. of Michael Mostyn, CEO of B’nai Brith Canada issued a stement reading, ““Jama’s first attempt at an apology is not at a level acceptable to B’nai Brith Canada or Ontarians in general. Her apology appears to inherently deny her pattern of radical behaviour and solely on the language recorded in one disturbing video. This disingenuously markets her problematic history as a one-off. Both Jama and the NDP owe the Jewish community the courtesy of publicly communicating her disavowal of the antisemitic BDS movement that she has long supported.”
The byelection was the topic of discussion on the Bill Kelly Show Friday, with Bay Observer publisher John Best.
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