bout de papier, Vol. 29, No. 2 (2016), pp. 31–32
Flora MacDonald had a very real love and fascination for the Middle East and for all of its people. She had been inspired as a youngster by the letters of an uncle who died in Mesopotamia with a British regiment fighting the Ottomans in World War I. She said that these letters are what sparked her interest in world affairs.
Her international achievements were many and varied. Perhaps she was proudest of the initiative that accommodated 60,000 Indochinese boat people in Canada, a precedent that should inspire us as we face the tsunami of Middle East and North African refugees today. The Tehran US hostage caper. Her contribution to the identification and repression of the trade in blood diamonds in Africa. The empowerment of Afghan village women toward the schooling of their chidren, girls and boys.
Following are a few glimpses of her interacting with the rich humanity of the Middle East.
Flora was not a trail-blazing intellectual. She was audacious and creative in her commitment to people, to the exploration and fulfillment of the simple values learnt from the father she admired so much and his responsibilities in their United Church congregation in North Sydney. She was radically decent. The old hymns comforted her to the last as I had seen how they sustained her in the chapel of the Scottish Hospice in Jerusalem. Grandiose development funding did not excite her, but her passion was for the growth of persons and what they could do, with a bit of mostly moral support, to advance their local communities. Of local NGOs she would ask the essential question to her: “How do you involve your beneficiaries in your planning?”
We spent time together in each of my postings, twice in Israel and Palestine, once in Jordan, twice in Iran, twice again in Egypt. Ten days before her death, her face lit up as I gave her news of the l’Arche workshop in Bethlehem (one of the communities of persons with an intellectual handicap, founded by Jean Vanier) and recounted to her one of her favourite memories: how she had danced with wheelchair-bound Elias, with Down Left to right: Sheila Muttart, Michel de Salaberry
Syndrome, one of a small group of friends from l’Arche Palestine with whom we shared Christmas dinner in 1989. The day before we had joined Palestinian Christians for the Christmas Eve service in Shepherds’ Field, led that year by Bishop Tutu.
She was adventurous. Driving on her own in Israel with only her sister Sheila in the car, she once took a wrong turn and ended up heading into an IDF missile
King Hussein had been informed
wanted to see her immediately tc the work in Jordan of the IDRC, wt help in obtaining ambulance
bunker by the Lebanese border. By the number of times she re-told the story, it probably impressed her more than she admitted.
She was also fond of remembering a winter day when she walked on the sea shore next to Jabalya camp in Gaza, where the first intifada had started, and had run into a handful of workers, one or two of whom spoke English. On our telling them that we were Canadian, they had subjected us to a severe and detailed exam of the Canadian voting record on UN resolutions. This extent of political literacy amazed and delighted Flora. On that same trip of hers, on New Year’s Day,.we were teargassed together when observing a Peace Now initiative to surround the old city of Jerusalem by a human chain of Israelis and Palestinians.
In Jordan, she amazed and exhausted Ahmad, one of the embassy drivers, by the energy with which she climbed the
hundreds of steps to the Altar of Sacrifice
] that she was in the country and to decorate her in recognition of /hich she had headed, and for her :es from a Canadian donor.
at Petra, just as she had tested my limits climbing Mount Sinai to witness sunrise a few years before. Ahmad was also terribly impressed when their drive North of Amman was interrupted by a phone call from the Palace. King Hussein had been informed that she was in the country and wanted to see her immediately to decorate her in recognition of the work in Jordan of the IDRC, which she had headed, and for her help in obtaining ambulances from a Canadian donor.
She had a Persian bug too. The vitality of Tehran cultural life struck a real chord in her, the performers who were only too delighted to perform if they were given the opportunity, the dynamic civil society community whose energy was rekindled by the interest of this distinguished Canadian visitor thereby rekindling her own, the thousands of keen Tehranis to be met on vigourous Friday morning walks in the mountains just North of the city, and even her one exchange with the police when walking the dog in the neighbourhood. On another later visit, she was keen to join on an excursion through Iranian Azerbaijan, to test the outlook of the locals ahead of the 2009 presidential election which ended so tragically.
In Egypt, she became a strong supporter of a modest community centre involved in everything from obtaining birth certificates for women who had none, to the provision of sewers, to coaching kids through a deficient public school system. For an impressive young member of the centre, she personally contributed a large chunk of the personal share required for a Future Generations scholarship for an MA in community development.
On a February 2004 visit to Cairo, she once came back home about three hours late, after nightfall, alone, after her driver had come back with Anne Stanfield (widow of Robert Stanfield), both of them in despair for having lost Flora in the throngs of built-up area not far from the Saqqara pyramids. Flora never understood why we would have worried. She had wandered out to explore a street market, at some point had realized that the car had left, and had simply HITCHED A RIDE back home. She was as delighted by the people who had helped her as they were af their new Canadian acanaintance Audace, ténacité, volonté, empathie ne sont quelques épithètes qui décrivent Flora MacDonald, politicienne canadienne qui s’est éteinte le 26 juillet 2015.
Née au Cap Breton, en 1926, ex-ministre du Parti progressiste conservateur, elle est surtout connue pour avoir osé briguer le leadership de son parti en 1976, alors que les femmes en étaient encore a leurs premiers balbutiements en politique fédérale. Elle est arrivée au 4° rang I ors du premier tour, les promesses de vote de ses collègues masculins ne s’étant pas matérialisées dans l’isoloir. Elle avait été élue pour la première fois en 1972 dans la circonscription de Kingston-Les Îles, fonction qu’elle occupera jusqu’en 1988.
Un autre haut fait marqua sa carrière : elle fut la première femme dans un pays développé a occuper le poste de secrétaire d’État aux Affaires extérieures, poste que lui confiera son adversaire dans la course au leadership, Joe Clark en 1979-1980. Ce sera la première fois qu’une femme occupera un ministère aussi senior au sein du gouvernement canadien.
Même si son passage a la tete du Ministère des Affaires extérieures fut bref, il n’en reste pas moins qu’elle a été l’un des acteurs importants I ors de deux des événements de politique étrangère les plus marquants de l’histoire canadienne récente. En effet, Flora MacDonald était a la tete du Ministère durant la crise des otages en Iran, alors que des diplomates canadiens ont hébergé six homologues américains qui avaient réussi a fuir leur ambassade ani était alors assiéoée et occu- Flora MacDonald a aussi joué un rôle determinant dans l’implication du Canada I ors de la crise des « boat people » vietnamiens. Avec son collègue Ron Atkey, qui détenait alors le portefeuille de l’Immigration, elle a lance le programme par lequel le gouvernement a permis aux Canadiens de parrainer des réfugiés pour les amener au pays et qui égalait ensuite le total accueilli par la population avec un nombre égal de réfugiés non parrainés. De cette façon, plus de 60 000 « boat people » sont venus au Canada, l’afflux de réfugiés le plus élevé par habitant de n’importe quel pays pendant la crise.
Après son retrait de la vie politique, suite a sa défaite aux elections de 1988, elle continua a s’engager dans des causes humanitaires, faisant meme du bénévolat a l’étranger alors qu’elle a plus de 80 ans. Au delà de la politique, le travail qui lui a Donne le plus de satisfaction fut au sein de l’ONG qu’elle a fondée : Future Generations Canada. Directrice de l’organisme de 1997 a 2007, elle a cherché a éduquer les femmes dans des endroits tels que l’Afghanistan et a introduire des systèmes participatifs facilitant le développement durable.
Suite a son décès, de nombreux hommages ont souligné sa compassion, mais aussi sa determination, sa force de caractère et son franc-parler. Même si elle ne se définissait pas comme féministe, son exemple aura toutefois permis de percer le plafond de verre en politique fédérale et ouvert la voie a d’autres jeunes femmes intéressées par l’implication politique. De cinq femmes élues en 1972, il y en avait
Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 29, No. 2 (2016), pp. 31–32. Read the rest of this issue →
