Winnipeg, May 4, 2012: Ta’Kaiya Blaney speaking at the Circle of Life Thunderbird House in Winnipeg about the need to oppose the Enbridge Gateway Pipeline Project. Photo: Paul S. Graham
One of the youngest passengers on the Yinka Dene Alliance Freedom Train is Ta’Kaiya Blaney, 11, of Sliammon First Nation in British Columbia. I don’t believe I have seen a more articulate, self-possessed, and inspiring child in my life.
She spoke in Winnipeg last night, at the Circle of Life Thunderbird House, about the struggle to stop the Enbridge Gateway Pipeline. Her presentation was impressive enough, but then she performed “Shallow Waters,” a song she co-wrote with her singing instructor, Aileen De La Cruz, and the audience was entranced.
“Shallow Waters” could become the anthem for all who love and seek to protect the Earth. And Ta’Kaiya Blaney? Well, judge for yourself. She could become pretty much anything she chooses.
UPDATE: After posting the first video I went to a Yinka Dene Alliance rally at the historic junction of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers. Ta’Kaiya was one of the featured speakers. Here she performs “Carried Away” – which is both a lament for the loss of the natural environment and a call to action. You can find the lyrics on her web site.
Winnipeg, May 4, 2012: Hereditary Chief Tsodih of the Nak’azdli First Nation speaking at a news conference at Circle of Life Thunderbird House. Photo: Paul S. Graham
The Yinka Dene Alliance is on a cross country mission to tell Canadians why they have decided to refuse the construction of the Enbridge Gateway Pipeline across their land. They arrived on VIA Rail last night and held a news conference this morning at the Circle of Life Thunderbird House in Winnipeg. Mainstream media response was underwhelming; it appears that most were distracted by Jim Flaherty’s visit to the Winnipeg Mint to watch the last shiny copper come off the assembly line today. Oh, those shiny pennies!! Oh, how bedazzling for the media!
Because most of the mainstream media declined the invitation to participate, you and your friends are unlikely to find out what was said — unless you watch this video and share it widely.
If you don’t have 52 minutes, here’s an interview I recorded last night at Union Station with Hereditary Chief Na’Moks.
St. Boniface MP Shelley Glover recently lectured Winnipeg broadcaster Michael Welch of CKUW-FM 95.9 on the virtues of “ethical oil” and the “balanced” approach of the Conservative government to energy development that has obtained the “support” of aboriginal people for tar sands development and the Enbridge Pipeline Proposal. Michael checked her assertions with Gerald Amos, former elected Chief Councillor for the Haisla First Nation for 12 years and a leader of the fierce opposition that is being mounted by communities across BC to the Enbridge proposal.
Was Glover poorly informed or spinning for her boss, Stephen Harper? Watch the video and judge for yourself.
After you’ve watched this, you may want to watch Tar Sands, Pipelines and Tankers – the forum at which Gerald Amos spoke, along with Wade Davis, Lynne Fernandez and Anne Lindsey.
The National Energy Board is conducting hearings on Enbridge’s proposal for a pipeline from Alberta’s tar sands to the town of Kitimat in the heart of BC’s Great Bear Rainforest. If approved, over 200 oil tankers would be navigating the difficult waters off BC’s Northwest Coast each year, making widespread environmental damage to BC’s coastline only a matter of time. Moreover, it will facilitate the marketing of even more dirty oil from Alberta’s tar sands, fueling that unfolding ecological catastrophe with profound consequences for the rest of Canada and the world.
The project is meeting fierce opposition, especially in northern BC, and the federal government has declared war on anyone who opposes this project. In Winnipeg, a coalition of environmental groups banded together to hold a public forum on February 16, 2012 at the University of Winnipeg entitled Tar Sands, Pipelines and Tankers. Over 300 people turned out to view an excellent 16-minute documentary by Pacific Wild entitled Oil in Eden and to dialogue with an expert panel, moderated by journalist Ricard Cloutier.
The Panel
Dr. Wade Davis is Explorer in Residence, National Geographic Society, Visiting Professor and Senior Fellow of the Masters in Development Practice (MDP) Indigenous Development program, University of Winnipeg.
As well, he is the author of The Sacred Headwaters: the fight to save the Stikine, Skeena and Nass.
Gerald Amos was Chief Councillor for the Haisla First Nation for 12 years. He has been a leading voice for conservation in Canada for thirty years.
He is the author of an open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Natural Resources Minister, Joe Oliver “No apology forthcoming.”
Lynne Fernandez, of the Canadian Centre of Policy Alternatives has an MA in economics from the University of Manitoba. As a research associate at the Manitoba office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Lynne has studied municipal and provincial social and economic policy. She is also interested in labour and environmental issues.
Anne Lindsey is former executive director of the Manitoba Eco-Network. Since 1984, Anne has worked on such Manitoba and national issues as nuclear waste, forestry, food, pesticides and environmental reviews.
I hope you can schedule some time to view the video report I prepared in collaboration with Ken Harasym for Winnipeg Community TV. At two-and-a-half hours, it is long, but it is crammed with information and analysis that make it well worth the time.
When asked if her party would support a moratorium on transporting radioactive nuclear fuel waste through Manitoba, Progressive Conservative candidate Heather Stephanson equivocated, saying she would not answer a “hypothetical question.”
By contrast, Green Party Leader James Beddome answered with a thunderous denunciation of allowing nuclear waste on Manitoba soil and declared the possibility of a Conservative government being elected Oct. 4 to be “hypothetical.”
Judging from the applause for Beddome and the lack of it for Stephanson, it was clear where the audience stood on this issue.
This is not a hypothetical issue. A movement has sprung up in Saskatchewan to prevent the establishment of a nuclear waste dump. A respected aboriginal elder, Emil Bell, is on a hunger strike against storing nuclear waste in Saskatchewan.
Kudos to Beddome for clearly stating his party’s anti-nuke position.
Manitoba citizens will elect a new provincial government Oct. 4, 2011 and environmental issues will play an important role in determining which political party forms that government.
Where should Manitoba Hydro construct its planned Bipole 3 transmission line – or should it be built at all?
How should we save Lake Winnipeg from choking to death on toxic algae?
How best can Manitobans respond to rising energy costs and climate change?
These are only some of the issues that representatives of four political parties debated in this two-and-a-half hour public forum held Sept. 14., 2011 in Winnipeg. Naturally, I brought my video camera.
I’m half-way through “Stop Signs: Cars and Capitalism on the road to economic, social and ecological decay” by Bianca Mugyenyi and Yves Engler and I’m already regretting my decision, a year ago, to replace my aging Mazda with a brand new Kia Soul. I would have been better off with a bus pass and the world would have been one infinitesimally tiny step closer to sanity.
By every conceivable measure, private automobile ownership is an irrational choice that drains our health, destroys our environment and locks us in a downward spiral of indebtedness. In a discussion hosted by the Manitoba Eco-Network on July 7, 2011 in Winnipeg, Yves Engler explains why.
“What if the Gulf could sue BP?” asks Maude Barlow, National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians. “What if the ocean around Japan could sue the owners of the nuclear facility? What if the Athabasca River could sue everybody? What if Lake Winnipeg could sue for the nitrates we dump into it everyday?”
April 20, 2011: Dennis Lewycky (NDP), Ilona Niemczyk (Liberal) and Jacqueline Romanow (Green) at a Federal Election Forum on the Environment at the First Universalist Unitarian Church in Winnipeg. Photo: Paul S. Graham
If the state of our environment is a defining issue for you in this Canadian federal election, you must be disappointed at the scant, superficial mainstream media coverage to date. Despair no more.
I attended an “all-candidates” forum on the environment in Winnipeg last night (April 20, 2011), and posted a two hour video on YouTube to redress this portion of our democratic deficit. (For other insightful creations, go to http://youtube.com/redriverpete – but I digress.)
The phrase “all candidates” sits between inverted commas because the Conservative Party, true to form, chose not to participate. The Bloc Quebecois was not invited, understandably, because it is not running in Winnipeg (or elsewhere outside of Quebec). Other parties were excluded because they are not running candidates in all ridings.
Nonetheless, representatives of the Greens, the NDP and the Liberals were there. All gave good accounts of their respective parties’ positions. The questions put by the organizers were challenging in substance and comprehensive in scope. Panelists and audience members addressed each other intelligently, thoughtfully and respectfully. In short, it was an informative, educational evening, refreshingly free of the rhetorical bombast that passes for political discourse in this era of spin doctors and attack ads.
Grab some non-GM popcorn if you can find some, kick back and enjoy. And don’t forget to share this with friends and family, because it may be one of the few opportunities they will have to compare the environmental positions of three of the four main parties running across Canada. As for the Tories, the silent empty chair on the stage pretty much illustrates their environmental platform.
