Former Milton councillor may take run at recently-vacated MPP seat

A high-profile, former Milton politician may be eyeing a run at the provincial parliament seat open in Milton.

Rumors are circulating on social media that Zeeshan Hamid has been asked by the Conservative Party of Ontario to put his name in the ring to replace Parm Gill, who unexpectedly stepped down late last month.

While Gill is ramping up to run at the federal level, there is much speculation about who will compete to replace him.

Hamid would likely be a popular choice in Milton. He spent 12 years as a councillor before taking a run at the mayor’s seat in the last municipal election.

Hamid gave incumbent Gord Krantz, the longest-serving mayor in Canadian history, quite a battle, losing by less than 1,000 votes, one of the closest races Krantz has ever faced.

With a blended family of six, Hamid has remained active in Milton, running the very popular Milton Talk group on Facebook and continuing his career as VP of Engineering at Sensei Labs, creating enterprise digital workplace solutions.

Another name that has been floating around to replace Gill is new Liberal leader, and former mayor of Mississauga, Bonnie Crombie.

The byelection has to be called within six months of the seat coming open, so by the end of July. It will likely be called by the Doug Ford government once a Conservative candidate has been confirmed.

Inhalton.com has reached out to Hamid for comment but had not heard back by the time this story was published.