{"id":334,"date":"2008-09-18T11:20:17","date_gmt":"2008-09-18T16:20:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/election08.cusjc.ca\/?p=334"},"modified":"2008-09-18T11:20:17","modified_gmt":"2008-09-18T16:20:17","slug":"no-time-for-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/?p=334","title":{"rendered":"No time for politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Laura Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n

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He\u2019s been in Canada for 20 years, and became a citizen in 1992, but Jose Campos can count the number of times he\u2019s voted in federal elections on one hand.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhy vote?\u201d asks the man who\u2019s cast two ballots in as many decades.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe want a political party that will help us with our problems, but they look like they have their own, and they\u2019re fighting for their own.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Sitting in an immigrant resource centre on Argyle Ave.<\/span>\u00a0in Ottawa\u2019s Centretown neighbourhood, Campos uses the free computer service to check his email and keep in touch with those back home in El Salvador.<\/p>\n

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He still speaks with a heavy Spanish accent and laments the state of finding a job in Canada without speaking perfect English, something many new Canadians <\/ins><\/span>–– <\/ins><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/del><\/span>and even the no-so-new ones- struggle with on a daily basis.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s these realities of finding work, a home, getting education for themselves and their families, and adjusting to a different culture and climate, that occupy the lives of Canada\u2019s immigrant population.<\/p>\n

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And some of them just don\u2019t have time to bother with politics, says Mengistab Tsegaye, the program director of Lasi World Skills, which helps immigrants find jobs in the labour market.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe first years they\u2019re just getting settled, and they don\u2019t even think about the political process,\u201d says Tsegaye. \u201cThey have bigger challenges, just trying to settle and find employment, get their kids to school.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It takes immigrants at least three years before they are eligible for citizenship, and in that time, finding work with the \u201ctwo years of experience\u201d cloud that hangs over most jobs is a major barrier.<\/p>\n

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Many organizations don\u2019t specifically teach immigrants about the political process, although citizenship classes cover the basics. Ottawa\u2019s Catholic Immigration Centre offers English classes, where the election may be covered in conversation. And Elections Canada has voting guides on its website in over 25 languages.<\/p>\n

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Yet the disillusionment many new Canadians face in their transplanted homes often translates into political apathy and henceforth, political under-representation.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhatever happens is not their views. They\u2019re not represented\u201d at the polls, says Tsegaye.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhatever has been decided, they are not being part of that decision. They don\u2019t have a voice, for the most part.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Some groups speak for them. The Ontario Council of Agencies Servicing Immigrants, for example, recently posted questions on its website asking the four major candidates their specific immigration policies and main issues- like employment- facing new Canadians.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s something they do for every election at every level, says Amy Casipullai, the program and policy coordinator for OCASI.<\/p>\n

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\u201cPolitical parties rarely focus on issues facing immigrant communities,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe opportunities for recent immigrants to actively get engaged themselves…has been difficult for a lot of immigrants, especially immigrants from racialized communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Campos\u2019s dilemma, like many, is work-related. He\u2019s been back and forth between Canada and El Salvador in those 20 years, and his wife and 10-year-old daughter came to Canada to live with him only a month ago. In his native country, Campos, 42, worked as a bank manager, and here, he\u2019s worked in administration. He\u2019s currently looking for a job.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s not that Campos hasn\u2019t heard of the candidates or their policies: he just can\u2019t find anyone he likes.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen you lost trust, it\u2019s very difficult,\u201d he says. \u201cWe don\u2019t have any representative. They don\u2019t want to help young families, that\u2019s it.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Campos says he doesn\u2019t believe in the Canadian political system to make positive changes in his life. He, like many others, eschews the vote.<\/p>\n

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But that\u2019s not true for everyone. There is a flip side, immigration groups say. Although there are many new Canadians who find it difficult to engage in politics, some immigrants are so impressed by the existence of an organized system that they do get involved in the process.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere are some that are very active,\u201d says Tsegaye. \u201cMost immigrants come from countries where there\u2019s no political process or democracy. So some of them get really, really excited and they participate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laura Stone is a student in the Master of Journalism program at the School of Journalism and Communication at Carleton University.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Laura Stone He\u2019s been in Canada for 20 years, and became a citizen in 1992, but Jose Campos can count the number of times he\u2019s voted in federal elections on one hand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election2008","category-election-2008-student-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=334"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":336,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334\/revisions\/336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}