Alberta Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides provides an update on teacher bargaining in Calgary, on Friday, Oct. 17, 2025. (Image Credit: The Canadian Press)

By The Canadian Press

First citizen recall petition against Alberta legislature member fails

Jan 20, 2026 | 3:14 PM

The first of more than two dozen recall petitions launched against members of Alberta’s legislature has come up short.

Jenny Yeremiy submitted Tuesday her petition against Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides to Elections Alberta but said she needed thousands more signatures.

She says the campaign collected about 6,500 signatures, well short of its required 16,000.

The petition was launched in October and, if successful, would have forced a constituency-wide vote on whether Nicolaides should lose his seat in the legislature.

Yeremiy says she thinks the petition should still be considered a success, because it helped get people organized ahead of the next provincial election set for October 2027.

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“We want to put on the record that there are 6,500-plus of us that are angry with the way (Nicolaides) is abusing his rights,” she told reporters outside of the Elections Alberta office in Edmonton.

“I can tell you we have a lot more ideas now that this is done and a lot of more time on our hands to do them.”

The petition was the first of 26 launched against members of the legislature in the final months of 2025.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 20, 2026.