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Former Global TV reporter expected to run in Richmond

Jas Johal has reportedly been asked to stand in the new Richmond-Queensborough riding for the BC Liberals next May
Jas Johal
Jas Johal

The Thanksgiving turkey is a memory, the Halloween decorations are going up, and Christmas is around the corner, but it’s not too early for speculation about who’s going to run in Richmond in the coming provincial election next spring.

With Richmond’s BC Liberal incumbents all in place to run again, the focus is on filling in the remaining blanks, including who will run for the governing Liberals in the newly created riding of Richmond-Queensborough.

Although official party sources have not announced who they will have on the ballot come May 9, the News has learned that  former Global BC reporter Jas Johal has been asked to run.

Johal, who left the TV news business two years ago to become director of communications for the BC LNG Alliance, has been courted by the Liberal party and may have finally found a landing spot in the riding that straddles Richmond and New Westminster.

The News was unable to contact Johal and his former email address had an automatic reply that indicated he was no longer with the alliance.

As for who might run against Johal, if he becomes a candidate, the NDP is looking at Jack Trovato, a secondary school teacher in Burnaby, who ran for the NDP in the 2015 federal election in Richmond Centre, finishing third behind Conservative Party winner and incumbent Alice Wong and Liberal challenger Lawrence Woo.

Trovato also tried his hand at municipal politics in the 2014 vote, running for school trustee. He finished 14th at the polls that elected the top seven candidates for the board of education.

Trovato told the News that, while the process of becoming a candidate for the NDP is still a ways down the road, he was keen on representing the riding in a community he “deeply cares about.”

In the riding of Richmond-Steveston, digital marketer Ramesh Ranjan is mulling a bid to displace BC Liberal John Yap. And community activist Henry Yao is considering putting his name up for the NDP in Richmond Centre-South, where 25-year veteran MLA Linda Reid is running.

Ranjan was an NDP volunteer campaign worker during the 2015 federal election. And Yao ran for one of eight seats on Richmond city council in 2014, garnering 4,412 votes (1.79 per cent), good enough for 21st place overall at the polls.

Yao said he chose that riding because that is where he spent much time as a youth worker and has connections in the community.

No word yet on who is thinking of taking on Richmond Centre-North incumbent Teresa Wat,  B.C.’s Minister of International Trade, Asia Pacific Strategy and Multiculturalism –  who ran successfully as a political newcomer in 2013.