Harjit Sajjan: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

TORONTO–Why is Harjit Sajjan still in cabinet? He may have been a good Vancouver detective, and he won praise for his work as a liaison officer with the Afghan police for Canada’s battle group in Kandahar (although the mission proved to be a failure). The honours and medals bestowed on Sajjan, including the Order of Military Merit, made him a political catch, a star candidate for the Liberals in the 2015 election. Given his background, he seemed like the ideal choice as defence minister in Justin Trudeau’s cabinet. Alas, he proved to be a letdown; an obedient foot soldier for the Prime Minister’s Office, he performed poorly as the general of his own department. After decades of media reports of sexual misconduct in the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), Trudeau’s first mandate letter to Sajjan in 2015 told him that, “it is important that your behaviour and decisions meet Canadians’ well-founded expectations of our government. I want Canadians to look on their own government with pride and trust.” That portion of the letter, a boilerplate sent to other ministers as well, was little more than a public relations exercise that now reads as something of a joke, considering Trudeau and some of his ministers’ ethical lapses since then. Specifically, Sajjan was also mandated to “work with senior leaders of the Canadian Armed Forces to establish and maintain a workplace free from harassment and discrimination.” However, on Sajjan’s watch, not much changed. The same year that he joined the cabinet, a report by former Supreme Court justice Marie Deschamps laid bare the sexualized culture in the CAF. In 2018, after CAF Ombudsman Gary Walbourne presented evidence of improper sexual behaviour by then-chief of the defence staff Jonathan Vance, a hostile Sajjan refused to look at it. Rather, in an abject failure of leadership, he ran with the file to the Privy Council Office, Trudeau’s department, where it went to die. Three years later, Sajjan, the minister with eyes wide shut, told the House National Defence Committee that the allegation regarding Vance was news to him, learned only recently from press reports. One wonders: what happened to the constitutional principle of ministerial responsibility? Though Sajjan embarrassed himself, Trudeau kept him in the cabinet. Fast forward to last month, when Sajjan was caught in the imbroglio surrounding Senator Marilou McPhedran’s issuance of ostensible visa facilitation letters for entry to Canada to hundreds of Afghans after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Sajjan, who was still defence minister at the time of the takeover, told the House Immigration Committee he was too busy to monitor the emails telling him that McPhedran was sending the admission letters without the government’s approval. Sajjan’s reason for not reading his emails does not wash. All ministers are busy. That is why they have a stable of political and departmental staffers to assist and keep them informed. They serve as a minister’s eyes, ears, and nose. After his appearance at committee, Sajjan refused to answer media queries or show up for Question Period. Presumably, he was too busy. Trudeau finally demoted Sajjan to the international development portfolio after the 2021 election, and replaced him at national defence with Anita Anand, who had performed well as minister of public services and procurement during the COVID-19 pandemic. She seems to function as a prophylactic tonic for the errant boys in the military, having acted promptly on former Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour’s subsequent—somewhat redundant—report on sexual misconduct at Department of National Defence/CAF. Most recently, Anand transferred nearly 100 reports of sexual offences from military to civilian police authorities. In his new post, Sajjan and the government have continued to fail to distinguish themselves. After Turkey’s devastating earthquake in February, several countries including Israel, Germany, and France immediately sent search and rescue teams and emergency services personnel. Even before Sajjan got around to issuing a statement on the catastrophe, Israel—a country with a fraught relationship with Turkey—had pulled 19 survivors from collapsed buildings and set up a field hospital that treated nearly 500 survivors, including Syrian refugees. Sajjan, speaking for the government, simply settled for sending an assessment team to determine how Canada could contribute, underscoring that the deployment of the team did not guarantee any further assistance. It was left to Calgary-based Samaritan’s Purse, Toronto-based GlobalMedic, and British Columbia-based Burnaby Urban Search and Rescue Society—all humanitarian aid charities—to raise money for an emergency field hospital and to send rapid response teams. The president of the Federation of Canadian Turkish Associations said it was “very sad” that Ottawa had not committed to sending any search and rescue teams, a criticism echoed by the Syrian Canadian Foundation. Perhaps Sajjan is too busy to read this. Nelson Wiseman is a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Toronto. His most recent book is 1950s Canada: Politics and Public Affairs (University of Toronto Press).

Harjit Sajjan: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

Whether at defence or international development, Harjit Sajjan has failed to distinguish himself, writes Nelson Wiseman.

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Harjit Sajjan: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

Whether at defence or international development, Harjit Sajjan has failed to distinguish himself, writes Nelson Wiseman.

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