Manitoba PC leader Khan survives confidence vote

Manitoba Progressive Conservative Leader Obby Khan survived a confidence vote last week.

Caucus communications director Alison Sutherland confirmed the vote was held Friday and that Khan still has “the full confidence” of the PC caucus.

She did not provide further details.

The party under Khan’s leadership is floundering, a recent poll suggests.

The quarterly Free Press-Abacus Data poll shows the Tories have lost ground while support for Premier Wab Kinew’s NDP climbed to its highest level yet.

Kinew’s personal approval rating increased five percentage points to 68 per cent year-over-year. Khan’s rating decreased three points to 31 per cent.

With an election year looming, 60 per cent of those surveyed said they would vote for the New Democrats and 29 per cent said they would back Khan’s Progressive Conservatives.

The timing of the leadership confidence vote comes as no surprise to one political analyst.

“This is not unusual for a leader to have to defend him or herself when the polls are tanking,” University of Manitoba adjunct political studies Prof. Christopher Adams said in an interview.

“When your numbers are tanking, and you’re a sitting MLA and you’re looking around (wondering), ‘Well, which of us is going to survive the next election, and can we do it with this person?’”

Adams said the PC party has traditionally attracted members and candidates willing to make hard business decisions and focus on results.

“It makes it more likely that the Conservative MLAs will look at their leader and say, can we proceed with this person or do we have to make a hard decision about moving to somebody else?” he said.

Adams said there’s no obvious successor waiting in the wings to replace Khan. His leadership challenger Wally Daudrich has quit the party and ran for the Keystone Party in The Pas-Kameesak byelection in the summer.

“Is there somebody else in the caucus that’s sort of scheming to take over?” Adams asked. “I don’t know, but it’s possible.”

After Friday’s confidence vote Manitoba PC campaign director Stephen Carter posted on social media that he had resigned.

Adams said the Tory leader will have to bide his time, hoping Kinew chooses not to seek a third term.

“When Obby Khan was made leader, he knew — or if he didn’t know, he should have known — that this was going to be a long, long, tough road. That would be likely two terms, and that’s eight years,” Adams said.

“That’s a long time to serve in opposition. But I think that he must have realized that when he chose to run for the leadership.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca