Photograph by: Jason Payne, Postmedia

When the BC NDP look back on 2010, they can only wonder where it all went wrong.

After nearly a decade on the sidelines, the BC Liberals had hit rock-bottom support among people angry over the HST and Premier Gordon Campbell. The backlash was so severe, in fact, that it gave the NDP a reported 21 per cent lead over the Liberals, according to a Nov. 5 poll conducted by Angus Reid.

For the good of the party, and possibly the province, Gordon Campbell announced on Nov. 3 he would step down as leader of the Liberal Party, pending a convention in late February that will choose a new one.

The resignation left two of the four parties in British Columbia without a leader. The BC Conservatives ousted their leader, Wilf Hanni, immediately following the May 2009 election in which they failed to win a single seat.

For a time, the NDP were riding high, and seemed secure to become elected to government in 2013.

Then, it all went terribly wrong. NDP MLA Jenny Kwan and a group of at least a dozen other dissidents — dubbed the baker’s dozen for some reason that escapes me — decided to suddenly pick this moment to stab NDP leader Carole James in the back. The ensuing bloodletting from party infighting resulted in James stepping down to secure the peace, leaving three parties in the province completely leaderless.

Since that time, the BC Liberals have managed to revitalize their polling numbers, thanks to a large jump from popular CKNW radio host and former deputy premier, Christy Clark. A Dec. 23 poll from Angus Reid shows the NDP and Liberals tied at 38 per cent each, a swing of 21 points over just seven weeks.

Why the dissidents decided to suicide bomb their own party is unknown. While I’m sure they had their reasons, the party’s chances of winning the 2013 election now seem slim to none.

Carole James, who had been leader of the party since 2003, had never been overly popular in the polls. Only two months ago she was riding a 25 per cent approval rating, even as her party enjoyed support from 47 per cent. But opposition leaders have traditionally fared poorly in polling, and this is historically true in both provincial and federal politics.

Worse than ousting James at a point of great momentum for the NDP, it doesn’t appear as though anybody is ready to step in and take the reigns. MLAs Mike Farnworth and Adrian Dix are the frontrunners in early polling, but there’s a problem with either of those choices.

They’re men.

According to the BC NDP’s own constitution, the next leader of the party has to be a woman, unless the males currently occupying the positions of president or treasurer resign. The current president is Moe Sihota and the treasurer is Bob Smits, neither of whom would be likely to step down without a fight.

This only complicates matters further for the self-destructing NDP. Not only did they sabotage their own success at a critical moment of Liberal weakness, but they appear to have ousted the only candidate without a penis who could lead the party to a successful win the next election.

Nor has there been any talk about bending the rules of the constitution, meaning the one-third affirmative action policy will take precedence over picking the best candidate for the job.

A permanent leader for the party won’t even be chosen until April, meaning there will be at least two months in which the Liberal Party will have a leader who can heap scorn on the disarray that is the NDP party. Worse still, that leader will likely be Christy Clark, a charismatic and popular female candidate polling higher than any NDP candidates right now. The irony may quite literally devastate the NDP.