Danielle Smith to speak at Alberta Day celebration as referendum nears

Premier Danielle Smith is set to speak in Calgary on Sunday afternoon at an event marking Alberta Day.

Alberta officially became a Canadian province on Sept. 1, 1905, and various festivities were planned this weekend ahead of the province’s birthday on Tuesday.

Smith’s speech at Calgary’s Heritage Park is set to come as the province’s separation referendum nears.

The premier has called a vote for Oct. 19 that will ask Albertans whether the province should remain in Canada or hold a second, binding referendum on leaving the country.

The premier has said she’s voting for the province to stay, and that hundreds of thousands of Albertans signed petitions in support of either separation or staying in Confederation.

She said their voices deserve to be heard.

Petitioners on both sides have pushed back against Smith’s approach.

Separatist leader Jeffrey Rath has accused Smith of betraying separatist UCP members, misleading Albertans and undermining the province’s interests in Ottawa.

Critics, pointing to long-standing opinion polls indicating massive support for Alberta staying in Canada, accuse Smith of self-serving politics by calling the vote merely to placate restive separatist hardliners in her United Conservative Party.

On Saturday, Alberta separatists converged outside the legislature in Edmonton, with many saying Alberta would be better off without Canada after having joined Confederation 121 years ago.

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Opposition NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi held a “Vote for Canada” rally in Calgary, also on Saturday. During that rally, he called for the fall referendum to be put off amid the escalating trade war with the United States.

Earlier this week, Thomas Lukaszuk, organizer of the pro-federalist Forever Canadian petition, made a similar call.

Lukaszuk said he was writing on behalf of the more than 400,000 Albertans who signed his petition.

“We submit that this is not the time for unnecessary domestic conflict; this is the time for Albertans to stand together with our fellow Canadians and collectively rally against this unprecedented economic threat,” Lukaszuk wrote.

Smith was asked about the calls to postpone the referendum amid the trade tensions during a recent interview with CTV News, but didn’t say whether rescheduling the vote was on the table.

Instead, she compared the anger Canadians in Quebec and Ontario might be feeling toward Trump amid the trade war with the anger Albertans feel toward former prime minister Justin Trudeau.

Smith has said before separatists have a decade-long list of resentments with Trudeau over his energy and environmental policies.

“I would say that in the last 18 months, the new prime minister and I have done everything we can to reset the relationship,” she said during the interview.

“But when you cause that kind of damage, people get hurt. That’s what we’re seeing in Alberta right now. I don’t think that you solve problems by ignoring them. You solve problems by addressing it.”

She said she is working to explain to Albertans that Ottawa is working for them, and vice versa, and renewed her call for Albertans to vote to remain in Confederation.