Dumont bids farewell to political life

Hours after handing in his resignation as the leader of the Action Dmocratique du Qubec, Mario Dumont said he may be done with politics for good.

Dumont is making a quiet exit from the spotlight, after shining as one of Quebec's brightest young political stars for more than a decade.

'I'm more than comfortable. I'm quite certain that I'm doing the right thing.' Mario Dumont, departing ADQ leader

Dumont made the announcement about his resignation, as well as his intention to give uphis national assemblyseat representing Rivire-du-Loup,in a letter to the party president Tuesday. His final day will be March 6.

In an interview with CBC News, Dumont said he knew his time was up after voters reduced his party to just seven seats in the national assembly last December.

"I'm more than comfortable. I'm quite certain that I'm doing the right thing," he said.

"I think the election showed that at this point it was more than a matter of a platform or what we proposed. It had something to do with the messenger himself. "

The ADQ was reduced to seven seats from 41 while the Liberals won 66 and the Parti Qubcois captured 51.

Co-founded party

Dumont co-founded the ADQ in 1994 with Quebec Liberal Jean Allaire, partlyto protest constitutional compromises agreed to by premier Robert Bourassa during the Charlottetown Accord talks.

Dumont, 38,became ADQ president and then leader before winning the party's first and only seat in Rivire-du-Loup in the 1994 Quebec election.

In the 2007 election, Dumont guided the right-wing ADQ from relative obscurity to official Opposition in Quebec City.

Former ADQ national assembly member Richard Merlini told CBC News that Dumont's departure will allow the party to rejuvenate itself.

"It will get the leadership race on the roll," he said.

However, some political observers are not as optimistic that the ADQ will be able to survive without its high-profile leader.

"Of all the parties I've seen emerge, come and go, there are hardly any [that are] more centred on a single person," said Laval University political studies Prof. Louis Massicotte.

Dumont going to private sector

After spending more than half of his life as a politician, Dumont doubts he'll be back.

"Certainly not in the short term and certainly not in the mid-term," he said. "I don't think I will do that again."

Dumont is expected to take a job in the private sector in the Montreal.

He wished the party and the future leader good luck.

"This is certainly a moment in which our party will be challenge and be forced to reinvent itself," Dumont said.