Frank Azevedo was fired by the city of Clarington on July 6.
The dismissal came after Azevedo, a 10-year veteran of the town's tiny municipal fire department, told a Toronto newspaper he feels there's been a lack of training and funding to deal with major disasters such as a terrorist attack or an accident at a nuclear plant.
``This is like a whistle-blowing issue. They are trying to muzzle people from saying what is true,'' said Jim Lee, a Canadian executive with the 265,000-member international firefighters union.
``Frank (Azevedo) just stated the facts.''
Lee said his association, which represents 19,000 firefighters in Canada, has demanded that Clarington reinstate Azevedo. The city has refused.
``You hurt one firefighter, you hurt us all,'' Lee said.
Frank Wu, the city of Clarington's chief administrative officer, said they do not discuss ``personnel matters'' but did say that a grievance has been filed. No arbitration date has been set.
Clarington Mayor John Mutton declined to comment Sunday.
Lee said the reason they were given for the sudden dismissal was for what the city says was ``disparaging remarks'' the firefighter made in a story about the federal election that appeared in the Toronto Star on June 22.
Azevedo had called for more resources for communities such as Clarington, which is near the Darlington and Pickering nuclear power plants.
A spokesman for Ontario's Ministry of Community Safety said the government has spent a substantial amount of money to upgrade preparedness in case of disaster.
