NL Government Cancels "Have" Status Celebrations

Premier Danny Williams announced today that plans to celebrate the Province’s “Have” status, on March 31st of this year, have been cancelled.

Publicly the Premier stated that the decision to cancel the celebration was made because the Province did not want to be seen as throwing a party at a time when the economy is in such bad shape and while all parts of Canada are suffering.

I don’t disagree with the move but I’d argue that the reasons behind the decision were not as simple as was presented.

Personally I’m quite pleased that the Provincial government has had second thoughts about this. From the start the timing was troublesome.

No doubt the festivities were planned to coincide with the beginning of the new Provincial fiscal year but the date chosen would also have placed that party on the calendar at the same time as the 60th anniversary of Newfoundland and Labrador’s entry into confederation. Not a date everyone in this Province would choose to mark as a joyous occasion.

The fact that the “Have” status celebration would have happened on that particular anniversary, whether coincidental or not, would no doubt have been portrayed in the National media as either Newfoundland and Labrador “mocking” the troubles in the rest of Canada or as the people of Newfoundland and Labrador happily celebrating how much the love being a part of Canada.

Neither of which would necessarily be factual, but then again when has the national media let the facts stand in the way of a story?

Thankfully a wise decision was made to cancel an event that would have accomplished nothing except to provided fodder for renewed attacks on this Province or, worse still, given the impression that we were celebrating 60 years of lost freedom.