The Coalition d’avenir Québec is celebrating the tenth anniversary of its founding at a general council meeting in Trois-Rivières. Back on a series of modulations which led the formation to choose a nationalist label after having rejected them all.
Within the touring caravans, electoral campaigns always end with a traditional dinner bringing together the chef, his team and the journalists. On September 3, 2012, less than twelve hours before the opening of the provincial polling stations, Martin Koskinen, eminence grise of François Legault, is seated at a restaurant table. “Our goal is to replace the Liberals”, he sketches between two courses, in the hubbub of the room.
The Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) ended its first campaign that evening. On November 14, 2011, Mr. Legault launched his party by rejecting the labels. “We are neither federalist nor sovereignist, neither on the left nor on the right,” he said at the time, two years after leaving the Parti Québécois (PQ).
In power for nine years, the Liberals of Jean Charest tried in 2012 to obtain a new mandate despite allegations of embezzlement in political financing.
In the weeks leading up to the election, the Caquist caravan had ventured into Liberal strongholds on the West Island, courting the Anglophone vote. The journalists had noticed the presence of liberal personalities during a militant event at the headquarters of the Coalition.
Nine years later, Mr. Koskinen, now chief of staff to the Prime Minister, points out to the To have to that an “enormous political fatigue” existed with regard to the Charest government.
The Director General of the CAQ, Brigitte Legault, in office since 2011 except for a brief interlude around 2014, remembers today that her training had targeted the Liberal Party of Quebec (PLQ) because “the vote to seek was there “. However, the party had limited resources and information to develop its strategy. “We didn’t have any data,” says M.me Legault in an interview. Just to campaign in 2012, like the others, it was already a success. “
In the middle of the campaign, the new political formation nevertheless achieves a smoking blow: Mr. Legault announces the candidacy of the former police chief Jacques Duchesneau in the constituency of Saint-Jérôme. He presents him as “our Eliot Ness from Quebec”.
But that was not enough to defeat the Liberals. Jean Charest elected 50 members of the opposition. The PQ and its 54 elected officials can only form a minority government. The CAQ must be satisfied with 19 deputies.
Mme Legault, who had herself been an activist for the Liberal Party of Canada, recalls how the CAQ then found itself caught between the PQ and the Liberals, with a minority government. “It was a difficult time,” she admits.
Like disappointed hopes, Jacques Duchesneau threw in the towel in early 2014, a few weeks before the start of an electoral campaign by Pauline Marois, who hopes to obtain a majority mandate.
“I gave what I could offer,” he says.
This departure sets the tone for the Caquist campaign, whose slogan is “We give ourselves Legault”.
The Peladeau eclipse
A few days late, while the campaign is in full swing, it is the PQ’s turn to make a splash. With a raised fist, Pierre Karl Péladeau announced his candidacy for Saint-Jérôme, at the very place where Mr. Duchesneau had just bowed out. In the CAQ ranks, some are “devastated”.
We didn’t have any data. Just to campaign in 2012, like the others, it was already a success.
François Legault struggles to make his message heard in the sovereignist-federalist polarization. At the end of March 2014, ten days before the vote, he changed registers.
“If you want to admit that the nine Liberal years gave the shit we have now, well… change! Try another recipe, ”he says.
Two days later, he tries to emphasize that he has the courage to lead Quebec. “Jean Charest did not have balls, Philippe Couillard does not have more”, he affirms. Wasted effort. The CAQ obtained fewer votes than in 2012. But won three more seats, for a total of 22, in the April 2014 poll.
Five months later, the CAQ caucus met in PQ territory, in Saguenay. The target has changed. After two elections, the party has data. Brigitte Legault observes a trend.
“The PQ was in free fall,” she said. This was not quite the case with the PLQ, which maintained its level despite the commissions of inquiry. “
But the planets are not yet aligned. In the opposition, François Legault is subjected to an almost daily eclipse: Pierre Karl Péladeau, who becomes leader of the PQ in 2015.
“He was in the same casting that Mr. Legault, with a strong notoriety ”, remembers Pascal Mailhot, who was in the entourage of the chief Caquist.
Quebecor’s controlling shareholder shines brightly in the halls of parliament every morning. Journalists do not hesitate to leave the CAQ leader in the background when his opponent appears.
Trying to come out of the shadows, François Legault sometimes makes astonishing remarks. One morning in May 2015, Mr. Legault affirms that Quebecor will be unable to obtain the return of the Nordiques because Mr. Péladeau is a separatist.
In the background is then played the by-election of Chauveau. The CAQ struggles to keep this constituency abandoned by its deputy, Gérard Deltell, who made the leap into federal politics.
Television host Julie Snyder, then Mr. Péladeau’s spouse, campaigned on the ground for the PQ. And the Liberals, who will ultimately win the riding, repeat in their doorstep that Mr. Legault is still a sovereignist.
After this bitter setback, Mr. Legault admits that he is going through a difficult period. He says he even thought of resigning.
A blue logo
But the CAQ continues its “blue march”. The group decides to refine its message. In November 2015, the CAQ made its nationalist turn. The training replaces its multicolored logo with a new one, all blue and fleur-de-lis. She unveils a plan that provides for a series of demands in Ottawa, including constitutional recognition of the Quebec nation.
The CAQ finally chooses a label. “And the label was nationalism,” says Brigitte Legault. We had to adopt one so that voters understand the project we were putting on the table. “
In May 2016, the sky cleared up. After a year at the head of the PQ, “PKP” left the ship. “His departure has freed up space,” says Pascal Mailhot. We gradually started to climb in the polls. “
In May 2017, the CAQ exceeded the PQ in voting intentions. “A major step,” said Mailhot, now director of planning in the Prime Minister’s office.
If the partial of Chauveau marked the crossing of the desert of the CAQ, two years earlier, that of the constituency of Louis-Hébert, in Quebec, concretizes the momentum of the political formation, in October 2017. One year from the general election, the CAQ delighted this liberal bastion thanks to its candidate Geneviève Guilbault.
The CAQ could very well have disappeared below the 20% mark and become a formation which would have joined others in the footnotes of political history books.
At the headquarters of the CAQ, Brigitte Legault sees an opening. “We were everyone’s second choice,” she says. The challenge, to maintain this favorable trend, is to show that the CAQ is not the party of one man. Mme Legault is working to increase the announcement of candidates.
“After a few said yes, the wheel started to turn,” she explains. The crescendo, we created it. »Chantal Rouleau, Sonia LeBel, Pierre Fitzgibbon, Christian Dubé. Then Marguerite Blais, the former liberal minister.
“It was a big symbol that at the PLQ, it’s over,” says Mme Legault. On her own, she convinced people 65 and over to vote for us. “
For the political scientist from the University of Alberta Frédéric Boily, the nationalist turn of the CAQ was decisive. “The CAQ could very well have disappeared below the 20% mark and become a formation which would have joined others in the footnotes of political history books,” he said.
Part of this success can also be explained by a change of tone, according to Mr. Boily. ” [La CAQ] had in 2018 a government party speech, he says. The elements of protest populism that the CAQ dragged along in 2012 and 2014, we had put that aside. “
Around 2022
With less than a year before the elections, with a mandate marked by the management of the pandemic, the CAQ sits at the top of the polls with levels of support that could increase its caucus from 75 to 100 deputies.
With Liberal and PQ opponents in a weak position, BrigitteLegault notes that the CAQ still has a challenge ahead of it. Expectations are high and success will depend on his proposals. “If we do a campaign against our opponents, it is sure that we lose,” she illustrates.
The Caquist militants will also meet in general council this weekend in Trois-Rivières to discuss proposals targeting the regions.
Until the election, the party will also have to continue to justify its decisions on a daily basis, underlines Mr.me Legault.
“This is where you can be your own enemy,” says the strategist. You are on TV, every day you have a message to carry, and every day people follow what you say. In the opposition, you are a little more in the shade. “