The municipal election campaign is barely a day old and Naheed Nenshi is already challenging his fellow candidates to publicly reveal their donor lists.
He made the request shortly after filing his nomination papers on Monday and said it’s very important for all candidates to do so.
“I think it’s incredibly important that we have real openness. I have called for campaign finance reform for so long and I continue to run this campaign as if tougher rules are in place and one of those rules includes disclosing my donor list and I will do that today.”
Some of the other high-profile candidates in the mayoral race were reluctant to take up Nenshi on his challenge.
“I may release some of the smaller donors, but there’s some specific donors that asked not to be revealed, so I might reveal my entire list with the exception of those who choose not to,” said Andre Chabot.
“We haven’t even considered it,” said Bill Smith. “We’ll talk about that as we get closer and over we get some donations in.”
On Tuesday, Nenshi released his donor list, listing names of individuals and organizations who have donated up to $5,000 towards his re-election campaign.
There are nine candidates looking to defeat Nenshi in the election next month and they will be getting together for a forum at Mount Royal University from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday.
There are 130 candidates running in the October 16 election and the full list is now official.
