Vanderhoof, B.C. – Dan Brooks says he’s turned down an offer to lead the BC Conservatives into the May 9 provincial election.

Dan Brooks after he regained the BC Conservative Party leadership, albeit briefly, last September – photo 250News

The Vanderhoof native was ousted from the job over a technicality by the party’s board of directors last October (see previous story here).

This after he had regained the position at a leadership convention in Prince George in September after stepping down voluntarily in January 2016.

Brooks says he received the offer to come back around three weeks ago – something he concedes he didn’t see coming.

“I was flabbergasted, like are you kidding me? You just destroyed me and after you’re not able to recruit somebody else, you come back to me?” he says. “So, it was too little too late at this point. There’s nothing I can do.”

(250News contacted BC Conservative Party spokesperson John Twigg for confirmation on the offer but he declined comment. He told 250News to contact party president Corbin Mitchell by email. Mitchell consequently hasn’t responded to that request).

Though Brooks says, “there’s too much water under the bridge” to mount a campaign this time around, he isn’t ruling out revisiting a run for the leadership in the run up to the 2021 provincial election.

In the meantime, he notes the party is still leaderless and has only nominated a half dozen candidates for this election with little chance of electoral success.

“There’s a lot of disenfranchised voters in this province as a result of this. It’s very unfortunate, it’s a very sad situation and quite frankly I think there’s a lot of federal Conservatives that should do a little head scratching, thinking about what’s happening to the Conservative brand in this province, and why it’s diminished.”

In the meantime, Twigg says he expects another dozen or so party candidates will be vetted “soon” though he notes running a full slate of candidates (87) in time for May 9 is unlikely.