As a federal election campaign nears across Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec, the race to win a seat in the House of Commons in the riding of Ottawa West-Nepean is set to be a showdown between two political veterans.

Local MP and Environment Minister John Baird is poised to run against former Liberal defence minister David Pratt, who was appointed to the party after the Liberals decided the looming election call leaves no time to hold a nomination meeting.

The veteran Liberal cabinet minister told CTV Ottawa he is ready for a fight and is set to be a strong challenger to Baird's success in the riding.

"People have a lot of difficulty, especially in the Capital here, with some of the positions that Mr. Baird has taken and his style of representation as well," Pratt said Thursday.

"I think he's proven himself to be rather partisan to say the least and that style turns a lot of people off."

Baird's controversial, brash style has polarized many voters one way or the other, said Mike Duffy of CTV News' Mike Duffy Live.

"But the strongest endorsement for (him) comes not from any Tory but rather from Bob Chiarelli," Duffy told CTV Ottawa.

"The former mayor looked at running in Ottawa West-Nepean and decided Baird was so dug in in the local community and had built alliances with so many diverse groups that he was going to take a pass."

The NDP candidate bidding for a seat in the west Ottawa riding is Marlene Riviere. Frances Coates will be campaigning for the Green party.

The Conservatives plucked 12 of this region's 18 ridings in the 2006 election. Besides Baird, the other Eastern Ontario cabinet minister running is Gordon O'Connor in Carleton-Mississippi Mills.

Meanwhile, in West Quebec the Bloc Quebecois won a seat in Gatineau and the Conservatives picked up Pontiac, where Lawrence Cannon became a cabinet minister.

Cannon may be in for a tough fight along with Baird, according to Fred Ryan, who edits the Aylmer Gazette, West Quebec Post and Pontiac Journal.

"Here's a comment I've heard more than one time," Ryan told CTV Ottawa. "We thought we voted for an M.P. We got a V.I.P. He's off all over the place. We see him in the newspaper. We see him on the TV. We don't see him here. And they want him here."

A federal election campaign is expected to kick off Sunday morning. Sources told The Canadian Press on Thursday that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is expected to ask Gov.-Gen. Michaelle Jean to dissolve Canada's 39th Parliament at 9 a.m. ET on Sunday, which would send Canadians to the polls on Tuesday, Oct. 14. Harper is expected to repeat an argument he has been airing recently -- that he has lost the confidence of Parliament.

 With a report from CTV Ottawa's Norman Fetterley