As the Oct. 3 election day in Manitoba draws closer, the Progressive Conservatives are now actively campaigning on their opposition to searching a Winnipeg-area landfill for the remains of two Indigenous women police presume are victims of an alleged serial killer.

In a full-page advertisement in the Winnipeg Free Press on Saturday, the PCs drew attention to four party campaign planks — and provided a place of prominence to leader Heather Stefanson's opposition to the landfill search.

"Stand firm," reads the ad, next to a photo of Stefanson bearing the caption, "For health and safety reasons, the answer on the landfill dig just has to be no."

The ad was published two days after a televised party leaders' debate where Stefanson raised the landfill search during the first opportunity she had to ask NDP Leader Wab Kinew a question about his support for a search. A pair of recent polls suggest the NDP is poised to wrest power away from the PCs.