First Nations

Idle No More Helped Aboriginal Canadians Break Cycle Of Despair

April 30, 2015 Ken Coates, www.exchangemagazine.com Educate! Canada, First Nations, Idle No More

The Idle No More movement first grabbed headlines more than two years ago, when thousands of First Nations people and their supporters took to the streets in protest over conditions for Aboriginals that in many cases were far below what other Canadians have come to expect. In this excerpt, Coates explores the history of abuse and exploitation that led to what has been an amazingly optimistic and powerful expression of Aboriginal unity and engagement. Many Canadians have long since forgotten about the movement. But Coates says the movement’s legacy continues today. Ken Coats“The combination of deeply entrenched grievances, sustained prejudice, and serious community difficulties, with the recent significant achievements and important victories of real re-empowerment has proven to be an extremely powerful mix”, he writes.

N.B. Premier Says Gov’t Will Improve First Nations Consultations

March 21, 2015 The Canadian Press, www.atlantic.ctvnews.ca Educate! Canada, First Nations

New Brunswick Premier Brian Gallant says changes are being made to improve government consultation with First Nations groups. He says at least one person in the leadership of each government department will be trained on the duty to consult. Gallant says too often across Canada, governments and other groups wait too long before beginning consultations. He says too many people think consultation is only needed on energy projects, adding that even the construction of a school could impact a waterway and First Nations may have concerns that their rights are being infringed.

Idle No More Message Still Resounds Across Canada

February 4, 2015 The Sheaf, www.thesheaf.com Resist! Canada, First Nations, Indigenous Rights, Law, Media

Sylvia McAdam and Jessica Gordon are remarkable women. They, with intrepid co-founders Nina Wilson and Sheelah Mclean, created Idle No More in 2012 to protest Bill C-45, the Harper government’s omnibus budget bill. Amongst other things, the bill aimed to amend the Navigable Waters Protection Act, reducing environmental protection for waterways across Canada. The movement’s largely indigenous followers marched, rallied and peacefully blockaded for months all over Canada, dominating national and international headlines. Ultimately, Bill C-45 was passed, but Idle No More is still widely seen as a game-changer within Canada regarding indigenous issues due to the youth of the movement and its’ use of social media.

CALLOUT To #ShutDownCanada Friday, February 13th

February 2, 2015 Mike Roy, www.revolution-news.com Resist! Canada, First Nations, Indigenous Rights, Indigenous Women, Land Rights

CALL OUT for communities across Canada to blockade their local railway, port or highway on February 13th. Don’t buy, don’t fly, no work and keep the kids home from school. A diversity of tactics is highly recommended! Get everyone involved” (#ShutDownCanada). The ShutDownCanada callout was made by a group called In Solidarity with all Land Defenders who describe themselves as “a collective of indigenous and settler grassroots organizers/activists based out of so called Vancouver(xʷməθkwəy̓əm(Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) land)”.

Northern Dene Trappers Alliance Holding The Line

January 28, 2015 Idle No More, www.idlenomore.ca Resist! First Nations, Food and Agriculture, Tar Sands, Transportation

The Northern Dene Trapper Alliance have been staying in trapper tents for the past 60 days, 10 km north of LaLoche, Saskatchewan along Hwy #955. They established the Camp on November 19, 2014 to show their grave concern over the amount of uranium and oilsands exploration that is taking place in their traditional trapping, hunting, and fishing areas. On November 22, 2014 they erected a checkpoint to prevent vehicles associated with this exploration from going through. Saskatchewan Government sent a negotiator to the Camp in late November. On December 1, 2014 a dozen RCMP with their hands on their pistols and two video cameras rolling served them an injunction removed the barricade and a trailer from the side of the road. The people at the Camp are not going away. They have been keeping a presence despite the injunction.

Sapotaweyak Cree Nation Sets Up Blockade

January 27, 2015 CBC News, www.cbc.ca Resist! Canada, First Nations, Land Rights, Law

Members of a western Manitoba aboriginal community are peacefully protesting work on the Bipole III hydroelectric line, a project that requires the construction of a transmission line, two new converter stations and two ground electrodes for those stations.Screen Shot 2015-01-26 at 6.16.34 PM That construction will involve clear-cutting trees near Sapotaweyak Cree Nation, located north of Swan River in central Manitoba. Chief Nelson Genaille says the project will destroy their livelihood and way of life. "They use the land as they did before. Living off the land with the animals. You know using the medicines from natural Mother Earth. And even the water systems. All of that habitat is going to be impacted."

Blockade Planned For Port Metro Vancouver

January 21, 2015 West Coast Native News, www.westcoastnativenews.com Resist! Canada, First Nations, Land Rights

To answer the callout to #ShutDownCanada on Friday February 13th a collective of individuals have decided to to blockade Port Metro Vancouver. We will gather at 10:00 AM at the corner of Clark Dr. & E. Hastings to rally in support of individuals who choose to put their bodies on the line in the name of justice. We are calling on all supporters to join us and cheer them on while we together with communities across the nation#ShutDownCanada. We are inviting everyone to stand with us in solidarity on unceded xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) land. nə́c̓amət tə šxʷqʷeləwən ct. We are of one heart and mind.

Idle No More Has Raised Canadian Consciousness

December 29, 2014 Irvin Studin, www.thestar.com Educate! Canada, First Nations, History

Historically defeated, the French Canadian in Canada, and in Quebec especially, today walks with his or her shoulders held high, properly self-respecting and in turn respected by the English-speaking majority as politically equal and as hailing from a culture that is just as prestigious as the Anglo-Saxon culture of the historical victors in North America. The French language is today not only studied in all schools of English-speaking Canada, but is held in equally high regard in official national institutions and, just as importantly, in the minds of most Canadians. An anglophone can therefore become prime minister of Canada while being a rank naïf in international affairs, but not without more or less mastering (and respecting) the French language. The rehabilitation or resuscitation of the French Canadians in Canada from historical losers to political and cultural co-equals did not happen overnight. It took at least a few generations of conspicuous pushes in policy and constitutional reform — propelled also by the heroism and strategy of many intellectuals and political actors from French Canada in general and Quebec in particular.

First Nation Files Land Claim To Stanley Park And Gulf Islands

December 11, 2014 Amy Judd, www.globalnews.ca Resist! First Nations, Land Rights, Law

A B.C. First Nation is taking the federal and provincial governments to court for two billion dollars and a massive land claim. They say more than 100 years ago they lost their land when it was shelled by a Royal Navy gunboat. “When you look at our history and genealogy you will see that we’ve always been here and did not, as Canada would suggest, simply fall out of the sky one day in the last 10 or 15 years,” said Hwlitsum chief Raymond (Rocky) Wilson. “Our serious dispute is not with private land owners or other First Nations, but with the Crown, Canada and the province, in this case British Columbia, who have consistently hidden their heads in the sand and ignored what we have to say.”

How Kinder-Morgan Pipeline Was Defeated

December 6, 2014 Maryam Adrangi, www.occupy.com Resist! Canada, Energy, Environment, First Nations, Oil & Gas

For years, residents and neighbors of the British Columbia city of Burnaby have been ringing alarm bells about Kinder Morgan’s intention to put a multi-billion dollar pipeline project through the region. Local First Nations and many city councils were vocally opposed to the pipelines and the associated infrastructure of terminals and tankers. As surveyors for Kinder Morgan have been researching the proposed pipeline area around Burnaby Mountain by drilling boreholes, volunteer caretakers have maintained an active presence on the mountain since September. But it was a $5.6 million lawsuit from Kinder Morgan, filed on Oct. 30 against five named defendants, that sparked a massive community response resulting in over 100 arrests of Indigenous elders, community members and youth.

Dene Block Road In Saskatchewan To Stop Oil Companies

November 26, 2014 Brent Patterson, www.rabble.ca Resist! Canada, First Nations, Oil & Gas, Protests

A group of northern trappers is blocking a road near LaLoche, Saskatchewan to prevent oil companies' access to exploration camps north of that point. LaLoche is located about 600 kilometres north of Saskatoon and about 100 kilometres east of Fort McMurray. A media release notes, "The Dene people of Ducharme, who have made a living from the land for centuries, have found access to their trap lines blocked by security gates. ...Trappers are making a stand because for the past 6 and half years, there has been a mad rush on mineral and oil exploration. ...The trappers are concerned that they are being ignored and driven off of their lands by oil and mineral companies, like Cenovus from Calgary, Alberta."

Cree March To Ban Uranium Exploration

November 25, 2014 Marian Scott, www.montrealgazette.com Resist! Canada, Energy, Environment, First Nations, Mining

Seven young members of the James Bay Cree Nation began an 800-kilometre trek from Mistissini to Montreal Sunday to demand a ban on uranium development in northern Quebec. “We want a uranium-free Eeyou Istchee (Cree territory), ” said Youth Grand Chief Joshua Iserhoff, 36, who set out with six others at 11 a.m. in minus-2-degree weather. They plan to arrive in Montreal on Dec. 15, the final day of hearings on uranium development by the Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE). The march underlines the Crees’ opposition to uranium exploration and mining, which they say would encroach on traplines, poison the environment and threaten their traditional way of life.

Dene Trappers Block Oil Companies In NW Saskatchewan

November 22, 2014 Northern Trappers Alliance, www.earthfirstjournal.org Resist! Canada, Energy, Environment, First Nations, Oil & Gas

The Dene people of Ducharme, who have made a living from the land for centuries, have found access to their trap lines blocked by security gates. Life-long trapper, Don Montgrand, reported, “When I drove up to my trap line, a helicopter followed overhead of me, all the way. That’s 106 km.” On Wednesday, November 19, 2014, a road block [was] established 8 km north of La Loche, Saskatchewan to prevent numerous oil companies road access to exploration camps beyond that point. Trappers are making a stand because for the past 6 ½ years, there has been a mad rush on mineral and oil exploration.

The Energy East Pipeline Won’t Get Built Either

October 31, 2014 Greenpeace, www.greenpeace.org Resist! Canada, Energy, Environment, First Nations, Keystone XL

fter TransCanada filed its official application with the National Energy Board today, environmental organizations in Canada and the United States, First Nations and community organizers said the Energy East pipeline will never be built. “It’s not going to happen,” said Patrick Bonin of Greenpeace Canada. “Energy East would negate all the good work on climate that has been done at the provincial level, pose a major threat to millions of people’s drinking water and disrespect Canadians in Eastern Canada, who care as much as any other Canadian about oil spills contaminating their homes, waterways and livelihoods.” Energy East – extending from Alberta to New Brunswick - would be the longest oil pipeline in North America and the single largest tar sands pipeline, transporting 30 per cent more oil than Keystone XL and double the size of Northern Gateway.

«1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 »

Daily movement news and resources