Canada Post president and CEO Deepak Chopra is one of 33 federal Conservative appointees the Liberal government has asked to step aside voluntarily. But CP board chair Sian Matthews, who wrote the government to keep Chopra, herself was named to the Canada Post board in 2007 and became chair in 2014 and the Liberal Party has, in the past, included her on a list of Conservative insiders who were granted federal appointments.
TORONTO – While the Liberals are trying to undo Conservatives’ gravy train by asking Stephen Harper appointees to hit the road, at least one organization wants their man to stay.
Canada Post wants the federal government to leave their president alone.
The chair of the Crown corporation’s board of directors has written to Dominic Leblanc, government leader in the House of Commons, demanding he withdraw a letter that was sent to Canada Post president Deepak Chopra and 32 other Conservative appointees to federal boards and agencies, reported CBC News.
All were appointed or extended in the final days of the Harper government before the election was called. The government’s letter asks that the appointees “voluntarily” step aside to allow the government to “establish an open, merit-based appointments system.”
Canada Post on Thursday sent out a letter of its own in which Sian Matthews, the chair of Canada Post’s board of directors, lays out the process by which Chopra was chosen as the company’s president.
“The rigorous selection process for this role included an international search conducted by a leading executive search firm,” the letter says. “It was advertised publicly, [and was] competitive and merit-based.”
Matthews goes on to list Chopra’s qualifications for the job, pointing out he was formerly president and CEO for Canada and Latin America at Pitney Bowes, as well as holding several other executive positions at the company over the course of his career.
Matthews also dismissed any suggestion politics had anything to do with Chopra being named Canada Post president.
“He has no political affiliations,” she writes.
After praising Chopra for his “thoughtful leadership,” which she credits for turning the Crown corporation into “a modern post, meeting both the needs of Canadians and our statutory obligation to be financially self-sufficient,” Matthews concludes the letter with a request to the new Liberal government.
“We respectfully ask you to withdraw the Dec. 7, 2015 letter. Responsible leaders, like Mr. Chopra, who commit to public service in this great country, should be celebrated, and not shamed.”
But Matthews herself was named to the Canada Post board in 2007 and became chair in 2014 and the Liberal Party has, in the past, included her on a list of Conservative insiders who were granted federal appointments.
Matthews has donated to the Conservative Party over the years, and was Stephen Harper’s official agent when he was elected as a Reform Party MP in Calgary in 1993. She declined comment to CBC News.
