Wednesday rally calls for Mayor Ford to step down
Posted November 13, 2013 7:51 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Protesters descended on Nathan Phillips Square Wednesday, calling for Rob Ford’s resignation as an unprecedented showdown between the embattled mayor and his councillors went on inside city hall.
Organizing group Save Toronto say Ford “has compromised the authority of his position,” after he admitted last week that he has used crack cocaine and police said they had the video of him allegedly smoking the drug.
The rally began at noon and coincided with a two-day meeting where council voted 37-5 in favour of Ford taking a leave to deal with what appears to be substance abuse issues.
The vote appears to be a symbolic victory only for councillors, as there are no measures in place to forcibly remove Ford from office.
Hundreds of people showed up to the rally. They wrote chalk messages, and performed chants.
“My biggest challenge with this whole situation, is the (lack of) accountability,” said Emily Hopkins. “My three-year-old understands more about consequences, and that your actions have consequences (than Mayor Ford) and I expect that of a leader.”
“This is not a role model for anyone’s children,” said Jana Orac, who added that Ford shouldn’t attend the upcoming Santa Claus parade. “We do not want kids asking ‘Mommy is Santa on crack too?’ It’s time to restore dignity to city politics.”
On Nov. 5, after months of denial, Ford admitted he had smoked crack cocaine.
Ford added that he doesn’t currently smoke crack and he’s not an addict, but has experimented with the drug.
“Have I tried it? Probably in one of my drunken stupors, probably approximately about a year ago” Ford said. “Yes, I’ve made mistakes. All I can do now is apologize and move on…it was a couple isolated incidents.”
In addition to what has been dubbed as “Crackgate,” there are incidents of being intoxicated at public events; he was fired from a volunteer football coaching job at Don Bosco high school; numerous staff were either fired or quit from his office during the crack video scandal; and, most recently, his friend Alexander Lisi was charged with extortion for his alleged attempts to retrieve the video in which Ford appears to smoke cocaine.
