Over the weekend, there were solidarity protests across the country in support of Indigenous activists in B.C. who are blockading construction of a $6-billion pipeline. The line, Coastal GasLink, will carry natural gas from fields in the northeastern B.C. to ports on the coast where it will be liquified and loaded onto waiting tankers.
From Vancouver Island to Calgary, Regina to Winnipeg and even Belleville, Ont., demonstrators halted pedestrians on a foot bridge, stopped traffic from entering highways and even caused days of train cancellations on the main VIA and CN line through eastern Ontario.
But the reasoning of the solidarity demonstrators is an intellectual farce.
The company, TC Energy, has signed benefit agreements with all 20 elected First Nations governments along the pipeline’s nearly 700 km route.
Four hereditary chiefs, however, object and protesters have rallied around this quartet.