The Montreal canadiens ice-hockey team´s Finnish captain Saku Koivu has been severely critisized in Quebec for not being able to speak French, the language of 83% of the population of the province.
The language-policy becomes a hot issue every now and then in a bilingual country like Canada.
Could this be equivalent to some foreigner being signed to a Welsh club to play whatever ball-game and only able to speak English?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ ... m_mostview
To everyone who thinks there is some sort of a language-war in Canada:There isn´t. Canada is officially a bilingual country.
Quebec is a case of its own(French the only official language in the province). In that province the question of language is constantly debated. The status of Quebec as province within Canada is not about to change as the PM of the province Chartrand is not going to hold a referendum on independence.
The separatist party Bloc Quebeqois knows that they would yet again lose such a referendum as before, albeit very narrowly, last time 12 years ago.
The Quebeckers know what is best for them. On independence the economy of the province would collapse. They receive money from Ottawa dozens of billions of dollars every year.All that money would be gone if they decided to go their own way. They would have to hike their taxes which already are the highest in Canada.
It is entirely for the Quebeckers to decide about their language policies but there is a law in the province that nothing official may be printed in English. English is banned in road signs. Nothing may be written in English inside public places. Probably the most intolerant language-law in the world.
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