OTTAWA — The president and CEO of the Canadian Wheat Board says he's being fired by the federal government for obeying the law of Parliament rather than Conservative policy.

Adrian Measner was making his first public comments since he was given two weeks' notice last week by Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl.

Measner and Ken Ritter, the CWB's chairman of the board, were supposed to address the Commons agriculture committee on Monday, but the meeting was cancelled without reason at the last moment after they had already arrived in Ottawa.

The board is battling the government over a Conservative campaign promise to end the CWB's long-standing monopoly on wheat and barley sales. The government wants to make participation voluntary, which the board argues would effectively kill the organization.

Farmers are split on the issue, but a majority of the current CWB board -- elected by grain producers -- wants to keep the single-desk model laid out in the Canadian Wheat Board Act.

"I find it quite ironic that ... I have been asked to pledge support for the government's policy of marketing choice, which is not the law,'' Measner told a news conference on Parliament Hill.

"In other words, if I continue to obey the law, I will be fired.''

His comments come the same day that MPs were howling for the resignation of embattled RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli, who has continued to enjoy Conservative government support.

Ritter said the wheat board legislation is not clear on whether Strahl even has the power to fire Measner.

"The CWB is not an agent of the government,'' said Ritter. "It is not a Crown corporation. All of the bills the CWB pays are paid by farmers, none is paid by the government.''

And the CWB act, Ritter noted, says the board of directors is to "manage and control the organization.''

Allen Oberg, a farmer from Forrestberg, Alta., who was just re-elected to the CWB board, said there are two ways to change the wheat board mandate.

One is through a plebiscite of grain producers, which the Conservatives have promised to do in the new year -- but only on the question of barley sales.

The other is for legislative changes in Parliament, which requires a majority of MPs.

The government has also issued a gag order on the CWB board, saying it cannot use wheat board resources to promote the single-desk model to its membership.

The board has decided to challenge that government order-in-council in court, arguing it is also outside the minister's power and calling it an infringement of their right to freedom of speech.

"It's a fight they have really brought to the wheat board, not the other way around,'' said Oberg.

Currently, all grain farmers must sell to the board which then negotiates with buyers, guaranteeing farmers a set price.

Opponents of the board, many of whom believe they could get a better price on their own, want the right to sell their own grain.