Vancouver City Hall is seen in Vancouver, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2021. Vancouver’s Chief Electoral Officer has filed an application in court seeking a declaration that 15 candidates in the upcoming municipal elections are not allowed to have their names on ballots in Chinese, in Persian or other non-Latin characters.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck Vancouver’s chief elections officer has filed a court application seeking a declaration that 15 candidates in the upcoming municipal elections are not allowed to have their names on ballots in Chinese, Persian or other non-Latin characters. Rosemary Hagiwara filed the application in provincial court on Tuesday, naming respondents including non-partisan mayoral candidate Fred Harding, current NPA councilor Melissa De Genova and veteran Vision Vancouver school board trustee Allan Wong. The application stated that all respondents submitted their “common name” to be used on the ballots in both Latin characters and Chinese or Persian characters. Ten are from the NPA, two from Vision Vancouver and one each from Forward Together and COPE. Hagiwara argued that none of the respondents who have previously run for municipal elections used non-Latin versions of their names in their previous nomination papers. The matter is due to be heard by the provincial court in Robson Square on Thursday morning. Harding said in an interview that his Chinese name was not something he “pulled out of a hat”. He said he has had a Chinese name for many years because half of his family on his wife’s side are Chinese. “Well, telling me that’s not my usual name, you can tell it’s like, ‘You really don’t know me,’” Harding said. Hagiwara’s affidavit said that when Harding initially submitted his nomination on September 6, he did not include Chinese characters in his usual name, but three days later revised his nomination to add them. He also said Harding did not include Chinese characters when he ran for mayor in 2018. Harding said that although the NPA had access to lawyers, none could respond to the matter by Thursday morning. Vision Vancouver said in a statement that Wong and council candidate Honieh Barzegar were disappointed at the prospect of removing their “unique and common names” printed in non-Latin characters from the ballots. But the party also accused other candidates of using “cultural appropriation” by adopting Chinese names by which they are not commonly known, to seek an unfair advantage at the polls. COPE school board candidate Suzie Mah said in a statement that she felt “shock and disbelief” that she was included among the respondents because her Chinese name was chosen by her parents and is part of her identity. “The reason why I use my Chinese name as well as my English name on the ballot is important to me. It’s not about getting extra votes with the Chinese community,” Mah said, adding that she was not someone who tried to ” create a Chinese name’ for election use. Mah said in an interview that her Chinese name was well known in the Chinese-speaking community. “I think in the future, if we want people to run for office and we want people to be a part of democracy, voting has to be accessible. When you put another barrier to people running for office, it’s very troubling,” said Max. He said there was too little time to seek legal advice before the hearing. Hagiwara said in her affidavit that she knows of no candidates who sought to use non-Latin characters on ballots before 2014. Only one candidate in each of the 2014 and 2018 polls had used non-Latin characters on the ballot, he said.
