Klein to quit this year after lukewarm party vote
CBC News | Posted: April 4, 2006 5:45 PM | Last Updated: April 4, 2006
Alberta Premier Ralph Klein said Tuesday that he will retire much earlier than planned after receiving a lukewarm vote of support from his party.
- IN DEPTH: Ralph Klein
Klein told reporters that he will write to Conservative party officials in September, asking them to conduct a leadership race. At that point, he will be less than two years into his current term.
He said he will resign as party leader and premier as soon as his replacement is chosen.
A leadership vote could be held in October or November, clearing the way for him to leave office in December but he stressed the timing is "entirely up to the party."
Klein had earlier said he would retire in 2008, but changed his plans after he received support from just 55 per cent of delegates to the Progressive Conservative convention in Calgary on Friday.
- FROM APRIL 1, 2006: Klein 'shocked' by weak leadership support
On Tuesday, he expressed thanks for messages of support from hundreds of Albertans.
"However, my term will be shorter than I originally anticipated, given the results of last weekend's vote," he said, adding that "political realities" prevent him from staying until 2008.
The one-time television news reporter and former mayor of Calgary has been premier since 1992.
His blunt-spoken, hard-drinking, down-home style struck a note with many Albertans, although the drinking seemed to get out of hand at times.
- FROM DEC. 19, 2001: Teary-eyed Klein says he's quit drinking
He governed during an oil-fuelled economic boom that enabled him to cut taxes, pay off the provincial debt and sock away billions of dollars in rainy-day accounts.
In January, the Alberta government sent $400 cheques â known variously as resource rebate cheques, prosperity cheques and "Ralph bucks" â to virtually every man, woman and child in the province.
- FROM JAN. 30, 2006: Albertans eager to spend prosperity cheques
Despite his public following, some in Alberta said he let the government's spending grow and its policies drift.
Others in his party said Klein's plan to step down in the spring of 2008 would have delayed a leadership race for too long.