A Petition To Rename Montreal Trudeau Airport After René Lévesque Has 20,000+ Signatures
A group of petitioners is done with Trudeaumania and wants Pierre Elliott Trudeau's name removed from Montreal's airport.
The reason is an American diplomatic document that says former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau plotted to harm Quebec's budding separatist movement by purposely increasing the unemployment rate.
Editor's Choice: The Government Has Made Changes To Its Montreal Quarantine Hotels
The December 22, 1976 report from ambassador Thomas Enders to the U.S. State Department says the Canadian government was thinking over aggressive strategies to make separatism less appealing including the "encouragement of key investors to pull out of Quebec."
It was penned shortly after René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois pushed out Robert Bourassa's Liberals and swept to power.
Trudeau asked one of Quebec's most powerful businesspeople, Power Corporation chairman Paul Desmarais, to "make it as tough as possible" for the province, states the report.
"Despite what Cabinet Ministers say, Trudeau may still be emitting punitive signals on the Quebec economy," it reads.
"Idea would be to set up spurt of provincial unemployment rate from current 10 percent to 15 or even 20 next year."
Accusing Trudeau of "economic sabotage," the petition to strip the airport of his name and rebaptize it in honour of René Lévesque had over 22,000 signatures as of the time of writing.
Current PQ leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon is one of the signatories.
"One could not imagine a worse form of contempt for our democracy, including all those Quebec voters who, in the previous federal election, had put their trust in the Liberal leader," the petition reads.
"The goal of this odious sabotage strategy was to deliberately undermine the socio-economic status of the Quebec people in order to further undermine the popularity of the independence movement."
"It's high time to clear our major international airport of the name of former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau," it continues.
"This man is unworthy of such an honour in Quebec."