Blockades an extortion attempt
By Letter to the Editor on March 6, 2020.
Canadians have a legal right to do business without harassment. Blockading of highways and rail lines is a blatant attempt at extortion and those who do it should be immediately removed by law enforcement!
Businesses hurt by the blockades (that are allowed to remain in place) should sue the government for failing to enforce the law resulting in financial losses to their companies! They should also sue the persons putting up the blockades.
Apparently neither Prime Minister Trudeau nor the Indigenous protesters have any respect for Canadian laws!
Bill Longbotham
Calgary
7-6
Both federal Conservative and Liberal governments have had the chance to get this fixed years ago already. So if there is to be talk on what is legal or illegal, now, the legal land rights of hereditary chiefs on their unceded lands needs to be recognized.
This could have all been avoided in a proactive manner. Lessons sure have been learned the drastic hard way. It sure is something that these blockades is what it took to get everyone’s attention.
On the contrary, Mr. Longbotham. It is the Canadian and British Columbia governments openly displaying contempt for Wet’suwet’en Law on unceded Wet’suwet’en territory and it is the RCMP and other security actively engaged in harassment.
In this regard, how do the actions of CGL, CGL Security, the RCMP, Premier Horgan and the Prime Minister’s statements, action or inaction correspond with the recent passing of Bill 41 in British Columbia together with the Prime Minister’s oft repeated “No relationship is more important to Canada than the relationship with Indigenous Peoples…” ?
https://www.leg.bc.ca/parliamentary-business/legislation-debates-proceedings/41st-parliament/4th-session/bills/first-reading/gov41-1
https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/statements/2017/06/21/statement-prime-minister-canada-national-aboriginal-day
Quite plainly, Mr. Longbotham, they don’t.
Moreover, the history of protest exists in Canada. It is a lengthy history and many Canadians are unaware, have forgotten about or take for granted hard won rights and privileges.
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/political-protest
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Canada (refer to the 20th and 21st century list)
As University of British Columbia PhD student Matthew Norris states, it is clearly evident that resolution of the issue at hand will not be accomplished with empty platitudes:
“We need more than “respect and communication.” We need substantive systemic change.”
https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2020/02/28/Blockades-Arent-The-Crisis/
i would say the extortion – and never just attempts, but real extortion – have come by way of “laws” that undermine the sovereignty and respect for peoples and the land. in case you have not opened your eyes in a good many decades, bill, the place has become a seething cesspool, pocked by increasing poverty among people, and increasing impoverishment of the planet. your type may not like diversity of peoples and species, and may not care for clean land and water, but, these must be acknowledged as inherent and inalienable rights and necessities.
i gotta ask, bill, how is it you fail to evolve and interact with reality?