Canada Looks To The East

If Canada's ruling Liberal Party felt humbled by last week's federal election, winning only 135 out of a possible 308 seats and forced to form the country's first minority government in 25 years, it was partly at the hands of people like Gurmant and Nina Grewal. Newly elected M.P.s from the Conservative Party and the first husband-and-wife team in the chamber, the Grewals' success is a sign of the growing political influence of Canada's Asian population.

Liberal leaders were once notorious for handpicking ethnic minority candidates to run in multicultural constituencies, but they're no longer the only ones courting the Asian vote. With a million Chinese and an equal number of South Asians now living in Canada, the two groups constitute half of the country's visible minority population and account for nearly 60% of its new immigrants every year. So the Conservatives, who won 99 seats, ran candidates like the Grewals in British Columbia this year, and the New Democrats (19 seats) aired TV spots featuring their multilingual party leader, Jack Layton, stumping in Mandarin and Cantonese. All in all, a record number of 28 South Asians ran in the election, and a total of nine Indo-Canadians and two Chinese Canadians won seats. "The reality is that multicultural communities are an integral part of Canada," says Gurmant Grewal. Of course, one Asian Canadian has already reached the top of the country's tree: Adrienne Clarkson, the Governor General, who came to Canada in 1942 as a refugee from Hong Kong. She is the representative of Queen Elizabeth II—Canada's head of state.