Surrey Vaisakhi Organizers Still Don’t Get It: They Issued a Non-Apology

This morning, we’re greeted with the news that the Surrey Vaisakhi organizers have issued an apology.

Before I get to the text of their efforts to make amends, let me tell you why this might be…

Firstly, you can thank Surrey Mayor Dianne Megawatts for having the political fortitude and solid principles to stand up to a disgraceful, garish, un-Canadian display of defiance over the weekend by extremists in the Surrey Sikh community. She withdrew from the parade when the “martyrs” float was brought on (that included pictures of terrorists connected to Air India) and rightly scolded the Vaisakhi organizing committee for breaking their word. Additionally, she suggested a FULL review of this particular group’s license would take place.

Secondly, you can thank me. No one else in the local media bothered to write as forcefully as I did about the political problems plaguing the Indo-Canadian community–and I did this out of love and respect for my many friends and readers in that community. I was invited by the producers of OMNI TV this week and I proudly appeared last night on the Punjabi edition of the OMNI News at 9pm. And since last night, I’ve received over sixty emails from Surrey alone, mostly from young Sikhs, thanking me for supporting the real values of their community: love, peace, civility and understanding, and shouting down the political thuggery of some organizers this weekend. I also called for the yanking of the Surrey Vaisaki’s license and the conditional awarding of said license to a group of reasonable, moderate Sikhs, who would do their culturally rich community proud.  This has spawned much discussion within their community and among moderates, certainly, my opinions matter: Because I lament, as I often have, that Sikhism is steeped in the teachings of compassion and understanding, not violence and threats. Yes, their history may have had times of strife and unrest, but it was about achieving peace and those efforts were sometimes defensive and not aggressive and offensive. What happened last weekend was an embarrassment, and disgrace.  MLA Dave Hayer and former Premier and MP Ujjal Dosanjh were threatened by a Neanderthal organizer. To add insult to injury, two organizers stood and defended those statements, one, a commentator with RED FM, instead of apologizing, fully.

And now the organizers have issued a mea culpa…so let’s have a look.

In a statement, the Gurdwara Dashmesh Darbar committee says it does “not believe in excluding any individuals from any of its event, regardless of politicial differences.”

But instead of apologizing to Messrs Hayer and Dosanjh, first, their abject non-apology was addressed to “the Canadian community”

This didn’t sit well with Mr. Dosanjh.

“I think it only behooves them to actually directly apologize to Dave Hayer and myself, you know, I’m not holding my breath for that to happen. It simply shows the character of these organizations.”

Ujjal Dosanjh continued, that he believed the organizers would apologize eventually because the City of Surrey threatened to refuse issuing a parade permit to this same group for next year.

And I agree with him. If it wasn’t for Dianne Watts’ leadership on this issue, you wouldn’t have heard a peep out of these knuckle-heads who think threatening their own (or anyone else) is the right thing do.

If these are the kinds of people immigration is letting in, then shut the doors until we can redraw the qualifications for meeting any kind of status or citizenship.

If you hate or want to bring foreign battles to this country, that will cost people trips to the hospital, or worse, one-way tickets to the graveyard, stay home, you’re not welcome here.

Immigration to Canada is a gift, not a right.

It’s time the vast majority of the Indo-Canadian community (who I know feel this way) stood up and defended the very significant contributions their community has made in this country and particularly this province, by strongly condemning the immigration of extremists and users.

Enough is enough.

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