A federal election isn't due for two years, but politics in Canada is beginning to get exciting. People are wondering whether Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in power since 2006, will step down or seek another term. He united the bickering Tories, won three elections and provided a stable government. But there are signs that Canadians might decide that enough is enough. There's the New Democratic Party leader Thomas Mulcair, who became the official opposition leader when in the last national election in 2011 the NDP came second, shocking the Liberal Party which had governed, or formed the opposition, for ages. The leader who propelled the NDP skyward was Jack Layton, whom everyone loved. However, sadly he succumbed to cancer. Mulcair has pushed NDP policies closer to the mainstream to soothe voters who felt that the NDP's progressive, people-oriented policies were too costly for a country weighed down by a deficit and debt. Now comes Justin Trudeau, the 41-year-old new leader of the Liberal Party. His predecessors - academics Michael Ignatieff and Stephane Dion and business tycoon Paul Martin Jr. - boasted formidable experience and achievements. But they couldn't excite the people and Harper defeated them easily in the last three elections. The new Trudeau lacks experience and has a thin CV, but he has clobbered all challengers - separatist politicians in Quebec on their home ground, an athletic hunk who challenged him in a boxing match for charity but left dazed and reeling, and rivals in his own party who together got less than 20 percent of the votes while Trudeau amassed more than 80 percent. Trudeau just might trigger his own version of Trudeaumania, as his father did a generation ago. Pierre Trudeau died in 2000 at the age of 80, but his intellect, charisma and personality overshadow his successors. Justin Trudeau inherited his charisma which neither Harper nor Mulcair possess and which eluded the last three Liberal leaders who were badly defeated. In opinion poll after opinion poll in the last year, the Liberals lagged behind the Tories and often the NDP, but with Trudeau as leader, the party is at the top and things look rosy. However, roses wilt and sometimes fail to bloom. The Liberal Party needs to repair its creaky organization, produce new ideas to deal with modern challenges and wean back the voters who have left the party. The next election is two years away and all parties have work to do. The Tories are strongest in western Canada which resents the domination of the country by Ontario and Quebec, with larger populations. The Tories have also gained popularity in Quebec and Ontario. The NDP has captured Quebec's support from the Tories, but Ontario has remained responsive to Tory overtures. Trudeau has to tend to all of these needs and has to develop talent in his party to convince the voters that the Liberals will field a strong team. Ethnic voters have long felt that the Liberals took them for granted. They succumbed to ardent wooing by the Tories, especially from Immigration, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney. But Pierre Trudeau excited them and Justin might just do the same. In a good omen for Justin Trudeau, the Liberal Party convention that elected him leader also featured a rousing speech by former prime minister Jean Chretien, who won stunning majority victories in 1993, 1997 and 2000 and whose courageous and wise decision to reject US pressure to join it in attacking Iraq saved Canada precious lives, moral standing and billions of dollars. Chretien has stayed away from politics after retirement but joined the convention this year to offer Liberals advice, encouragement and hope. This drama is unfolding as the Conservatives show signs of becoming weary and sometimes irrational. Canada, named first for its quality of life by the UN in the Chretien era, has dropped out of the top ten. It won kudos when its economy and banks showed resilience during the housing collapse and economic crisis in Europe and the United States. But falling commodity prices and the surplus of oil have lowered prices and hobbled the economy at the very time when manufacturing jobs are still being lost and when the country remains burdened with a deficit and debt at both the federal and provincial levels. On the world scene too, a country that was universally respected for its support for the United Nations and for universal human rights, justice and peace has become isolated and an enigma to its former supporters and admirers. Canada, for the first time, lost a bid to be elected to the Security Council while Portugal made it. Harper has time to try to repair the damage while Mulcair and Trudeau can stumble. There is speculation that the Liberals and NDP might cooperate in the next election instead of dividing their voters and enabling the Tories to win. Much can happen in the next two years. It should be interesting, especially because Trudeau excites people while to many Harper seems wooden by comparison.
— Mohammed Azhar Ali Khan is a retired Canadian journalist, civil servant and refugee judge
