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This will be the first time in all my years of intermittent blogging about issues on PEI that I will discuss the topic of the Chinese Communist Party’s(CCP) influence. In recent years I have heard the rumors, like everybody else has, about the monks in PEI being a front for the CCP to make land acquisitions. Or about how the Provincial Nominee Program was a way for the CCP to purchase influence with the political elite in PEI.
These are serious allegations, and I never felt comfortable writing about it without having first hand resources or incriminating documents I could look at. My hope was that somebody could eventually verify the sources and arrange all of them in one place so that Islanders could try and make sense of exactly what is happening.
Fortunately, this past Sunday, Dean Baxendale from Optimum Publishing along with the help of others put on an event at the Delta Hotel that summarized the results of a two-year investigation of CCP influence on PEI. Dean teamed up with two other experts; Michel Juneau-Katsuya, a former CSIS intelligence officer, and Gary Clement, a former national director for the RCMP.
Finally, I was going to get the chance to hear the arguments from somebody who had done serious work in examining whether indeed the CCP was using the monks as cover to push their own personal ambitions.
Before we examine the arguments, I think it’s important to try and figure out the motivations of the people involved. Right from the first few sentences he spoke into the microphone, Dean comes across as intense. Perhaps it’s because I’m used to politicians from PEI equivocate on this issue, but it’s nice to hear somebody speak with serious conviction on this issue. Whether you agree with or reject the evidence he presents, in my mind, there is no denying the motivations that appear to drive Dean. He is a fierce patriot that believes the CCP is waging a determined campaign to undermine the sovereignty of Canadians. Ultimately, he appears to believe in a country where Canadians are masters of their own destiny, not a foreign entity.
The documentary he presented on Sunday, along with a book, Canada Under Siege, are his efforts to see his vision come to life.
The documentary, which you can purchase here, is pretty extensive; and in my view, makes a compelling case that the CCP is using both the monasteries in PEI to establish a foothold in Canada. There were numerous interviews presented with Taiwanese officials, monks who left the monastery, PEI government whistle-blowers, activists, bank tellers, real estate agents, immigration brokers and more. If it was one or two interviews the case could easily be dismissed, but the sheer number of PEI residents that gave testimony about bags of money being exchanged make it clear there is something nefarious going on.
As impressive as the documentary was, I like the book more. I have not finished reading all of it yet, but I read large tracts and the authors did a good job in telling a story that captures the tragedy of PEI. This isn’t a story just about CCP influence, it’s a story about corruption, about an entrenched elite in PEI that works for their own interest. The book is well cited with 115 endnotes and plenty of space is given to e-mail and exhibit snapshots to support the arguments made.
The authors start with the government of Robert Ghiz and examine several events right up to the present day to show how just about every single institution in PEI has failed to really tell the truth about what is happening. It’s a pretty serious indictment that it took three outsiders to make this information public when in truth this should be the job of the government, police, and media in PEI.
I have a lot more to say on all this, but for anybody interested in this topic the best thing to do is buy the book, which should be available on July 8th according to this website. Take the time to digest the information and formulate some ideas. Once enough people are aware, it becomes easier to propose realistic solutions.
