EDMONTON - The Wildrose party has registered a complaint with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission about anonymous robocalls made in the lead up to Monday’s provincial byelections.

In a complaint lodged Saturday with Tom Lowry, the CRTC’s director of telecommunications enforcement, Wildrose communications adviser Vitor Marciano complained that voters who identified themselves as supporting the party’s candidates in previous polling calls were being targeted by a robocalls campaign.

Danika DeCarlo-Slobodnik answered the phone at her father’s house in Calgary at around 10 a.m. Saturday and was surprised by what she heard.

“I realized it was a robocall and figured I would listen to see what it was about,” said the 19-year-old health sciences student. “It said something about Danielle Smith having marched in a pride parade, and at least three different times it mentioned that grown men were prancing around in panties in front of children.

“It was worded inappropriately and it was clearly not a factual, objective survey.”

Marciano said the same robocalls were received by Wildrose supporters in all four byelection ridings on Saturday. The recording did not identify on whose behalf the calls were being made, Marciano said, and are in clear violation of election laws. The calls came from three numbers with prefixes that indicate they originated in Oregon and Washington state. The numbers seem to be connected to a polling company, but return calls to those numbers were answered by a recorded message.

“Our supporters are livid,” Marciano said, adding that Wildrose officials were inundated with complaints. “The calls are homophobic, sleazy and despicable, and they are clearly being made in an attempt to suppress voters.”

Monday’s byelections include races in Edmonton Whitemud, Calgary Elbow, Calgary-Foothills and Calgary West. Premier Jim Prentice, Health Minister Stephen Mandel and Education Minister Gordon Dirks are all seeking seats.

Earlier Saturday, the Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta contacted the province’s chief electoral officer to report that fake robocalls implicating the Tories were being made to voters in all four ridings.

The PCs said they were making calls, but only to party members, and are clearly identified as coming from the party.

Marciano said the Wildrose is placing calls to voters as well, but is not using an automated system.

“We are doing nothing but live calling,” Marciano said. “If somebody gets a robocall, it is not from us.”

On Saturday, Smith announced that she had asked provincial ethics commissioner Marguerite Trussler to investigate election tactics used by the PCs. In a letter sent to the commissioner, Smith complained that there were seven instances in which PC candidates or party members had unfairly used their offices to wield an advantage in the election.

mklinkenberg@edmontonjournal.com