Rob Ford's son praises 'the best dad'
Jenny Yuen
Today at 7:47 PM
Doug Ford, 8, the son of Rob Ford, holds a poster in front of his Etobicoke home on Wednesday, March 23, 2016. (Veronica Henri/Toronto Sun)
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Rob Ford’s son called his late father “the best dad I would ever have.”
Accompanied by a neighbour while his mother rested, and wearing navy blue and grey pyjamas, Dougie Ford, 8, came out to hold his own impromptu scrum on his front lawn Wednesday morning. He held a homemade Ford Nation poster and spoke candidly about his dad’s battle with cancer.
“I went up to my dad to say: ‘Daddy, you were the best dad a kid could ever have,” he recalled, looking back on those last moments at Mount Sinai hospital.
In the remaining time of the former Toronto mayor’s life on Tuesday, after a harrowing 18-month battle with a rare and aggressive form of cancer, the second grader left his father with poignant words that would make any parent proud.
“You were the best dad in the whole entire world,” Dougie said he told his dad. “You bought me toys and everything and without you, I would be nothing. You did everything for me. I don’t know what else to say.”
Dougie’s uncle Doug Ford chuckled at his nephew’s first media scrum and said he was fine with it being quoted in the newspaper.
“The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” the former councillor and mayoral candidate told the Sun’s Joe Warmington.
A number of Ford supporters dropped off bouquets of flowers and placed them outside the family’s Edenbridge Dr. home. Others created a memorial at Douglas B. Ford Park on Royal York Rd. in the heart of Etobicoke.
As reporters watched mourners arrive, the brave little boy came outside and began recounting his connection to his grandfather, former MPP Douglas B. Ford, and to his father.
“He was the best mayor and he was the best dad,” Dougie said. “He did everything right. He worked so hard every day. He didn’t stop. He kept going at it, going at it, going at it. It was pretty good.”
Dougie said that when he was four years old, he heard on the news his father had won the mayoral race.
“I asked him if that was true and he said, ‘Yeah, I am mayor.’ I was so happy,” he said.
“He got cancer. He was on TV, and it was a very bad pain. He had to drop out because he couldn’t be mayor anymore so then (my) uncle went in.
“My dad was really hurting. My mom said, ‘Maybe it’s just a little flu.’ It was a month. We waited a month. It was so bad. He was throwing up, so my mom brought him to the hospital and they said he had cancer.”
Dougie recalled his father needed an operation and they found a new tumour on his bladder last October.
“It was a big deal. He needed an operation. He got another cancer,” the boy said, adding he thought, “Oh my God, how can he do it? Because last time he did it.
“When he didn’t come home for a month, I knew something was going on. Is he dead? I don’t know.”
When the diagnosis came back with the odds stacked against his dad, Dougie said it felt like a whirlwind.
“We wondered, because last time it was a 99% chance he was going to live. That’s a lot of per cent. And 1% he was going to die. And now it was the opposite. It went so fast. How did it do that? If there’s only 1% chance of living and everyone is crying. I was so sad,” Dougie said.
Despite a chill in the air, the young Ford held up the collage of photos of his family to media. Canadian flags and the unmistakable signature blue, white and red colours of Ford Nation were also on the poster.
He pivoted around and waved his tiny fingers goodbye before racing barefoot towards the house.
“I’m going to be going in,” he said. “You guys take some pictures.”
jyuen@postmedia.com
