Philippine president’s visit to Canada won’t include Winnipeg

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This article was published 07/05/2015 (3801 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Some members of Winnipeg’s large and growing Filipino community say they’re disappointed their city isn’t on the itinerary of Philippines President Benigno Aquino visit to Canada this week.

“Personally, I think it would’ve been a very good gesture,” said Pilipino Express editor-in-chief Emmie Joaquin in Winnipeg. On Apr. 23 she was at Jimel’s International Cuisine in Winnipeg where visiting Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced Aquino’s visit to Canada. Joaquin said she heard Harper say Aquino would be stopping in Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg and Vancouver in early May.

Turns out Winnipeg isn’t on the list of cities Aquino will visit. He is scheduled to attend a state dinner at Rideau Hall with Gov. Gen. David Johnston in Ottawa Thursday, travel to Toronto Friday for a business roundtable and community reception then fly over Winnipeg to Vancouver on Saturday for a reception with Filipino associations there.

MLA Flor Marcelino was invited to see Aquino in Ottawa and will see him there Thursday night. She said she will ask him why he isn’t visiting Winnipeg.

“Surely several folks have expressed interest in seeing him in Winnipeg after the prime minister announced his visit to Canada,” she said in an email from Ottawa.

“I can appreciate their frustration,” said Marcelino, Manitoba’s minister of multiculturalism and literacy.

As for Joaquin, who has worked in Filipino media for decades, she said this is the fastest she’s seen a president’s visit to Canada announced and planned. She said earlier visits by former Philippine presidents were announced months in advance, with detailed itineraries spelled out ahead of time. For this visit, she said, the trip appears to have been planned on short notice. On May 6 she received an invitation to a reception in Toronto with Pres. Aquino on May 8.

“I was happy to be invited but that’s really short notice.”

Even though Winnipeg has a large Filipino population – an estimated 65,000 or nearly 10 per cent of Winnipeggers – Joaquin said Ontario and B.C. have more people from the Philippines. Canada has an estimated 800,000 people who identify as Filipino. They’re one of the largest non-European ethnic groups in the country. For many years, the Philippines has been at or near the top of a list of main source countries for immigrants to Canada and the main source of newcomers to Manitoba.

Aquino literally followed in his mother’s footsteps during his first state visit to Canada Thursday.

He planted a tree on the grounds of the Governor General’s official estate — just a few metres away from a tree planted by his mother, former president Corazon Aquino, during her state visit in 1989.

He even used the same silver spade his mother wielded 26 years ago.

Aquino’s tree, a red spruce that grows to more than 120 metres tall, will eventually tower over his mother’s sugar maple.

Aquino and Prime Minister Stephen Harper are expected to discuss expanding trade and investment opportunities, as well as co-operation on a range of issues including threats to global security.

— with files from The Canadian Press