(TibetanReview.net, Jun09, 2018) – Bhutila Karpoche has become the first Tibetan to win a seat in a provincial assembly election in Canada, having won from Parkdale-High Park to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario on Jun 7 night. Most of the Tibetan immigrants to Canada live in Toronto city of Ontario.
She has won her seat on a New Democrat Party (NDP) ticket in an election won by the Progressive Conservative Party.
A record number of seven candidates of Indian origin were elected to the legislature of Ontario, Canada’s largest and most politically significant province, as the Liberal Party was ousted from power after 15 years and the Progressive Conservatives easily gained a majority to form the next government, reported hindustantimes.com Jun 8. NDP is led by Jagmeet Singh of Indian origin.
Parkdale-High Park has been in NDP hands since Cheri DiNovo won a by-election in 2006. She won three more terms before leaving politics earlier this year to become minister at Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre for Faith, Justice and the Arts, reported thestar.com Jun 7
Karpoche had spent eight years working for DiNovo, first in her constituency office and more recently as her executive assistant at Queen’s Park. The report said DiNovo had wanted to add a Tibetan speaker to her staff to better liaise with Parkdale’s large Tibetan population, so she asked organizers with Students For a Free Tibet if they knew anyone who might be interested. Karpoche arrived and quickly became indispensable, DiNovo was cited as saying.
Karpoche, 34, moved to Toronto from Nepal when she was 18, settling into Parkdale, where she became a community organizer. She is fluent in four languages — English, Tibetan, Nepalese and Hindi — and is a PhD candidate at Ryerson University in public health policy.
