People

Sikh-Canadian Politician Killed After Stopping To Help In Highway Crash:
Manmeet Singh Bhullar

JUSTIN GIOVANNETTI, et al

MANMEET SINGH BHULLAR
March 1, 1980 - November 23, 2015

Manmeet Singh Bhullar was one of the rising stars of Alberta’s Progressive Conservative party, a young and determined MLA who had been entrusted with tough assignments in his party’s final years in power.

Manmeet Singh, 35, was killed in a car accident on a snowy Monday afternoon while driving from Calgary to Edmonton. According to first reports, he had stopped on the side of Alberta’s Highway 2 to assist a motorist whose car had rolled out of control. Manmeet was outside of his vehicle when he was struck by a semi-truck that had also lost control.

“The light in our lives went dark today. Manmeet Singh left us while he was doing what he loved more than anything – helping someone else,” his family said in a statement on Monday evening.

Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi kept close contact with the MLA and was one of the first to react to his death. He has issued the following statement:

“I am utterly gutted to hear of the sudden passing of Manmeet Singh Bhullar. A public servant, a true warrior for fairness and justice, a big man with a giant heart, a friend.

“Manmeet’s accomplishments are well-known. He was a powerful community advocate from a young age and first elected to the Alberta legislature at 28. He was brave and unrelenting in his role, particularly when it came to forcefully advocating for children in care – the least powerful people in our society.

“And this was his true calling – a man who defined integrity, who was genuine in everything he did, who never stopped fighting so that everyone could live a life of dignity.

“I always looked forward to our long lunches over vegetarian Hakka Indian food and chai in our neighbourhood, talking politics and community and religion and pluralism and life.

“He was one of the finest men I have ever met in politics, or anywhere. On our last lunch, he told me about how being in opposition wasn’t all bad – it gave him the time and capacity to work on issues that were very close to him, including the plight of Sikhs seeking to escape Afghanistan.

“I will miss him so much. We all will. And all of us are reaching out to his family and friends now. We will be there for you now the way he was always there for us.

“In my faith tradition, when we hear of a death in the community, we say ‘Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’un‘, which means “to Allah (God) we belong and to him we shall return.”

“It seems right to say that to a man of such deep, abiding, and unshakeable faith. Rest in peace, my brother. Waheguru Ji ka Khalsa, Waheguru Ji ki Fateh.”

Whether he was asked to speak about the construction of hundreds of new schools across Alberta or children who died in provincial care, Manmeet was one of his party’s most articulate and well-prepared spokesmen.

“He was one of those people who was respected across the aisle. He was a great public servant and he had a great career ahead of him. He was a future leader of the party,” said Duane Bratt, the chair of policy studies at Mount Royal University who had Manmeet as a student in the late 1990s.

Tall and imposing, Manmeet immediately put people at ease with his laid-back manner.

He was a champion at getting out the vote for his own campaigns as well as those of his political allies and harboured ambitions of becoming leader of the PCs – which he spoke about to an inner circle. However, when Jim Prentice decided to throw his hat in the ring last year, Manmeet was the first cabinet minister to publicly support him.

Recently, Manmeet had taken up the cause of religious minorities in Afghanistan and was pressing Ottawa to speed their refugee claims. He travelled to New Delhi earlier this year, where he met with Sikh refugees. He said there are at least 300 Sikh and Hindu families living in Afghanistan who face constant discrimination, the inability to fully practise their faith and threats of violence.

“Manmeet accomplished more in his brief time than most people accomplish in their lifetimes,” interim PC Leader Ric McIver wrote in a statement.

Manmeet was also one of only 10 Tories to survive the party’s fall from power in the spring.

“This is a land of opportunity filled with abundant natural beauty, a high standard of living and a can-do attitude,” he wrote during the campaign.

From Ottawa, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley responded to the death:

“We have lost our colleague, Calgary-Greenway has lost a friend and effective voice in the legislature, and most of all, we have all lost a passionate advocate for Alberta.”

In 2014, he became one of Mr. Prentice’s chief lieutenants, installed as infrastructure minister at a time when Alberta embarked on a wave of public works projects worth billions of dollars. Manmeet had worked with Mr. Prentice when the future premier ran for the leadership of the federal Tory party.

In 2011, Mr. Bhullar entered cabinet for the first time as Alberta’s service minister. In that role he lobbied federal regulators to protect consumers from what he considered unfair cellphone rules.

In 2013, he took over the province’s human services ministry at a time when reports emerged that more than 700 children had died in provincial care since 1999. After a four-year investigation by the ‘Edmonton Journal’ and ‘Calgary Herald‘, Manmeet lifted a publication ban on the names of Albertans who had died in provincial care.

“I believe it is a basic right of each and every one of us to express grief publicly. This decision is not one for the government to make; it is one for those closest to the child to make,” he said in a statement in 2014, explaining why he had lifted the ban.

A turbaned Sikh, Manmeet delivered an emotional address in Alberta’s legislature in early November about violence that had claimed thousands of Sikh lives in India in 1984. During his time as a legislator he worked to build relations between Alberta and India, helping negotiate a partnership between the province and the state of Punjab.

All flags on Alberta provincial buildings will be lowered to half-mast until sunset on the day of Manmeet’s funeral and the legislature will not sit on Tuesday, November 24, 2015, observing a day of mourning.


*   *   *   *   *

BIO

Manmeet Singh Bhullar was a Canadian politician and Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta who represented the constituency of Calgary-Greenway as a Progressive Conservative.

He served as a cabinet minister from 2011 until the defeat of the Progressive Conservative government in 2015. He was widely seen as a rising star in the Progressive Conservative caucus.

Manmeet, 35, was killed in an automobile accident on Monday, November 23, 2015, while trying to help the driver of another vehicle who was in distress.

Manmeet was born March 1, 1980 in the community of Penbrooke in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. His family then moved to the community of Whitehorn where he attended Chief Justice Milvain School and Annie Gale Junior High School. Manmeet then attended Lester B. Pearson High School in Pineridge, where he was a member of the school’s football team.

He earned his Bachelor of Arts with a Sociology concentration from Athabasca University in 2005. He also attended Mount Royal University as part of his post-secondary education. In 2011, Bhullar received his Bachelor of Laws from the University of Windsor.

Manmeet became very active in the community early on. He was the founder of a youth organization called "Inspire." He co-ordinated the ‘Walking Hunger Away’ campaign in Calgary and led a team of volunteers to raise money on behalf of the Calgary Health Region. He also worked with a number of other youth groups at the time.

Because of his community work, Manmeet was a recipient of the Alberta Centennial Medal, the Centennial Medallion, and the Athabasca University Leadership Award.

Manmeet has been a strong advocate for the issues of East Calgarians in the Alberta legislature.

He became active in politics early on by helping Rick D. Orman, the first MLA for Calgary-Montrose, in his re-election campaign. While seeking his post-secondary education, he was an organizer for Jim Prentice’s leadership campaign for the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in 2003.

Manmeet then worked with Jim Prentice when he was MP for Calgary Centre-North, aiding him with his role as Regional Minister for Alberta and the Territories.

Manmeet first sought public office in the 2008 provincial election in the constituency of Calgary-Montrose. At 28 years of age, he became the youngest member elected to Alberta's 27th legislature. He was appointed to the position of Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Advanced Education and Technology on March 12, 2008, making him the youngest politician to serve as a parliamentary assistant or secretary in Canada at the time.

In January 2010 he was made Parliamentary Assistant to Municipal Affairs.
Minister of Service Alberta

MINISTER OF SERVICE ALBERTA

On October 12, 2011 Manmeet was appointed to Cabinet as Minister of Service Alberta making him the first turbaned Sikh in the province to hold a ministerial position. In this portfolio, he oversaw the province’s vast network of registry agents, led Alberta's open government initiative and was the lead consumer advocate in government.

He is credited with finishing the "final mile" that has connected 98% of Albertans to high-speed internet and for pushing the CRTC to implement a national wireless code to protect mobile phone users.

Manmeet also received accolades for his work to crack down on unscrupulous contractors taking advantage of citizens after Alberta's flooding in 2012 and for laying the groundwork for a stronger condominium act, including a new dispute resolution system for condominium owners.

MINISTER OF HUMAN SERVICES

On December 13, 2013, Manmeet was promoted to the position of Minister of Human Services putting him in charge of the third largest ministry by expenditures in government and overseeing more than 4,000 employees. There he has been credited with fixing Alberta's child intervention system. He changed the law to empower families to speak up about their experiences with the system, made new investments in mental health supports for families involved in child intervention, hosted the first ever Alberta Minister's Forum on Child Sexual Abuse and began a campaign to find a mentor for every child in care in the province.

Manmeet was one of only 10 Progressive Conservative MLAs who were returned in the May 5, 2015 provincial election that defeated the Prentice government. He sat on the opposition benches in the Alberta legislature until his death.


[Courtesy: The Globe and Mail, Wikepedia, et al. Edited for sikhchic.com]

November 24, 2015
 

read other articles in People