(Alma) Éric Duhaime drew crowds to Quebec, Lévis and Trois-Rivières, but his supporters were less numerous to welcome him to Alma on Wednesday evening. The region had four CAQ deputies out of five when the elections were called.
Posted at 9:21 p.m.
From the outset, the Conservative candidate in Lac-Saint-Jean, Luc Martel, appealed for help. “We still need a lot of volunteers,” he said into the microphone. A campaign does not win itself! »
The Qc125 electoral projection site predicts CAQ victories throughout the Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean territory, even in Jonquière, where PQ MP Sylvain Gaudreault has decided to bow out. However, it gives the Conservative Party of Quebec second in four of the five ridings, except in Jonquière, where it would be third after the Parti Québécois.
Unlike the Lévis rally on Monday, the aisles between the tables were cleared at Alma’s restaurant where the leader of the PCQ gave a speech. Less than 200 people were present, according to the political party. Éric Duhaime did not take offense.
“Business is good, honestly, for the Conservatives,” he said in his speech. […] The last time I came to Alma, last year, there were about twenty of us in a room. »
He did not fail to recall that his father was a “blueberry” and that as a child he spent his summers in the region to visit his family.
LNG’s turn
In Lévis, Éric Duhaime insisted on the third link project in his speech. In Trois-Rivières, he had rather relied on opposition to the health measures imposed during the pandemic. In Alma, he relies on support for the GNL Québec project, where he makes it the issue of the electoral campaign.
This is an important project for your region. Everyone needs to have a say in this matter.
Éric Duhaime, head of the PCQ, about the GNL Québec project
It is this unequivocal support for the GNL Québec project that attracts Diane Boivin, a retiree from Saint-Félicien who is still hesitating between the CAQ and the PCQ. She said she was attracted to the personality of Éric Duhaime.
“He is a man who is true,” sums up Claude Boivin, from Jonquière, who became a volunteer for a political party, a first. “He seems sincere. It is for the people, not for their own pockets. »
For him, the Legault government went too far during the pandemic with health measures. This feeling is shared by Isabelle Tremblay of Saint-Nazaire, who decided not to be vaccinated, fearing the new vaccine against COVID-19. “There is no one who defended us,” laments the one who no longer recognizes herself in the four other parties that were represented in the National Assembly. She agreed to speak to The Press despite his distrust of mainstream media.
The candidate in Jonquière Isabelle Champagne was warmly applauded by Conservative supporters. His restaurant was closed for six days in May because his customers there did not wear the mask.
Éric Duhaime tries to channel this anger fueled at times by conspiracy theories. A man present at the rally told us about the idea that the elites attending the World Economic Forum in Davos are plotting to control the world.