A full-page ad in today's Globe and Mail shows a bleak black and white photo of a tanker floating in the midst of a vast oil slick. Underneath, the words 'This was Exxon’s Gift to Alaska. B.C. can expect the same from Enbridge.'
Today is, not coincidentally, the 21st anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and on the heels of the ad came an announcement from the Coastal First Nations (an alliance of nine nations from the central coast to Haida Gwaii) declaring that "...in upholding our ancestral laws, rights and responsibilities. . . oil tankers carrying crude oil from the Alberta Tar Sands will not be allowed to transit our lands and waters."
The oil tankers are part and parcel with Enbridge's proposed Northern Gateway pipeline project, which would deliver bitumen from Alberta to an expanded Kitimat port, and on to Asia, and would end a long-standing moratorium on oil tanker traffic on the B.C. coast.
Enbridge is facing serious opposition to another one of its Canadian pipeline projects, in Saskatchewan, where two summers ago bands there barricaded a road to a pipeline construction site.
Gerald Amos, director of the Coastal First Nations, stated in a press release that this, too, is "where Enbridge hits a wall."
"We will protect ourselves and the interests of future generations with everything we have because one major oil spill on the coast of British Columbia would wipe us out," said Amos. "This bountiful and globally significant coastline cannot bear an oil spill."
The Union of B.C. Indians Chiefs (UBCIC) also ratified a resolution opposing the pipeline.
Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the UBIC, stated in a press release, "The UBCIC is opposed to the Enbridge Pipeline Project and stands with the many First Nations who are standing as a unified block in their opposition to this proposed Tar Sands pipeline."
In Victoria this afternoon, Premier Gordon Campbell said the project would provide "hundreds and hundreds" of jobs to First Nations in the north, adding that government's job is to "try and find ways we can get the First Nations people engaged with pay cheques building the kind of economic future they need..."
The premier said the proposal will be subject to a rigorous environmental approval process. "I have concern that we allow the process to take place, allow First Nations to be fully consulted as we will across the north of the province and we'll see what the results of that are," Campbell said.
Campbell also said the project "meshes" with British Columbia's climate change goals. "We can in fact help other parts of the world reduce their greenhouse gas emissions dramatically by providing them with lower-carbon fuels in other parts of the world where they are using very high-carbon fuels like coal."
News of this unified and unequivocal position is also making the rounds on stock analyst and business websites. Uncertainty around First Nations relationships is already cause for concern amongst Enbridge shareholders. Last year, the vice-president of Ethical Funds, one of Enbridge's shareholders, told the Globe and Mail that First Nations opposition to the Gateway project was a clear risk to investors.
Aside from being a public relations problem, this opposition has so far not affected Enbridge's bottom line. Last month the company reported a 14-per-cent increase in fourth-quarter earnings and an 18-per-cent increase in full-year profits -- it's best in history.
Colleen Kimmett reports for The Tyee
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Gary
2 years ago
Jobs
Seems like whenever Campbell wants something to go ahead he always spews the same crap. Hundreds and hundreds, or Thousands of jobs.
Am I the only one that thinks this gets tiring after awhile? especially with the unemployment rates today.
Campbell, give your head a shake.
Whiskey River
2 years ago
The Pipeline will never happen!
This pipeline will be stopped before it starts.
If it means civil dis-obediance,pitch forks,it will not happen,one big spill and the BC Coast is dead for hundreds of years,where is Tzeporah berman?Does she have another green award for Gordon Campbell?A tar sand green guru award..You are finished Gordon Campbell,finished!..
90% of all oil tanker spills are human error,you can`t stop human error..Exxon Valdez was a tiny spill,36th largest in the world,a tiny vessel compared to what is proposed to move crude in the 4th most dangerous waters in the world.
"Recall in the Fall"
Gordon Campbell and 8 more BC Liberals will be removed from office through recall,it is not a matter of if they will be removed but when!
http://powellriverpersuader.blogspot.com/2009/11/it-cant-happen-again-can-it.html
pipeup
2 years ago
Yay CFN!!!
This is unprecedented unified opposition by the coastal First Nations with solidarity from across the tar sands along the proposed pipeline. The entire country needs to get behind them to shut this toxic project down that risks our beautiful coastline. And for what? While there are some construction jobs, Enbridge promises a whopping 42 long-term jobs in BC with a few more at the port of Kitimat. Gee, thanks. And that Campbell is touting this tar sands pipeline as providing "clean" fuel is completely outrageous and unbelievable that he would even try to spin it that way. Who briefed him on this project? Enbridge apparently (who donated generously to Campbell's campaign last election).
Grania
2 years ago
Everyone Needs to be Involved
Everyone that is able must plan to participate in active resistence. Everyone who is able needs to donate money to the activists who will prevent this appalling plan that will, in the end, destroy this part of our land. Hopefully, Campbell and Co. will be gone before they can sell us out!
Fiat lux
2 years ago
It is good to see the First
It is good to see the First Nations, and generally people all over, beginning top wake up to the crimes committed against humanity and the ecology in the name of "economics".
The biggest goddamn fraud in human history, taught in our universities as a "science".
Newton figured it out 300 years ago that all energy inputs cause equal reactions, which means that the so called "benefits" of these projects are always canceled out by the damages. And we can see the evidence all over in growing helplessness, poverty and illnesses that haven't existed before to any degree, but now are epidemics. Like cancers.
How long before the world will realize that this crime wave is licenced by the perceived power of non existing, imaginary money "created" from the air, slowly enslaving the whole world?
Democracy ? Yes, it was a nice dream at one time, but it is being killed by predators, unless people start standing up and demand answers.
Especially from the Priesthood of the Money God, the so called "economists".
Ed Deak,
freebear
2 years ago
Ed for benevolent King!
I'd vote for you!
Whiskey River
2 years ago
Enbridge died on the vine
Gordon Cmpbell knows Enbridge Pipeline is dead,now it matches his soul!
http://powellriverpersuader.blogspot.com/2010/03/gordon-campbell-erupts-in-anger-over.html
Janie Jones
2 years ago
Don't hold your breath.
"Campbell also said the project 'meshes' with British Columbia's climate change goals. 'We can in fact help other parts of the world reduce their greenhouse gas emissions dramatically by providing them with lower-carbon fuels in other parts of the world where they are using very high-carbon fuels like coal.'"
This must be why Campbell's award winning government is using the carbon tax to build highways and subsidize the NE BC oil and gas industry.
According to the Dogwood Initiative's website, "More than 30 protocol agreements have now been signed with First Nations and Metis groups in northern B.C. and Alberta, says Enbridge." In other words, the majority of First Nations whose traditional territories are actually crossed by the proposed pipeline and do not have fisheries potentially threatened by it are in negotiations for jobs and other considerations with Enbridge similar to the manner IPP developers have gained permissions to develop coastal watersheds.
http://dogwoodinitiative.org/media-centre/news-stories/rights-of-way-first-nations-and-enbridge-find-themselves-in-an-increasingly-complex-relationship
Fiat lux
2 years ago
Grania.....I never had the
Grania.....I never had the urge to lead, or follow anybody. Just put things down the best I can and from there anybody is welcome to praise, or curse.
Having lived under every known ideology and fought in war, I've been waiting all my life for people to wake up and shed all the faith based crap they've been brainwashed, enslaved and destroyed with since the beginning of history.
I'm still waiting, and looking at our and the world's ruling classes and governments today, can't help wondering why they're jailing small rapists, but let the biggest crooks fly around in private jets, to screw the world, willingly presenting their whatever?
In the past they could only do it to individual countries and societies, but now the whole world is open for them, shouting :"Come and take us !!",
Let's her the defenders of this crime wave come and say: "But they're only creating wealth!"
Ed Deak.
Barryeng
2 years ago
Wealth?
"But they're only creating wealth" (?) Someone else, or maybe Ed Deak quoted another person saying wealth cannot be "created", only redistributed.
In this case wealth is being redistributed from the ordinary people of British Columbia to Greedy Gordo's friends.
DJT
2 years ago
"Seems like whenever
"Seems like whenever Campbell wants something to go ahead he always spews the same crap. Hundreds and hundreds, or Thousands of jobs.
Am I the only one that thinks this gets tiring after awhile"?
Nope.
North of Hope
2 years ago
trickle up model
Good point Ed and Barryeng. It is not a trickle down model at work but a trickle up model. The money from the lower class and middle classes flows up to the bankers and executives.
Curt
2 years ago
All I can say is, Keep up
All I can say is, Keep up the Good Work! Enough of the deceit and lies. We must all follow the First Nations in stopping the destruction and raping by the corporations and their elite. They do not care about you, me, or the next guy trying to make an "honest" living going to work every day and trying to raise our families and take care of our own. It's the bottom line for these goons at any cost.
Janie Jones
2 years ago
Dream on Curt.
Over and over, the facts on the ground are that, in exchange for being cut in for a share, First Nations are collaborating with corporations and their elite not "stopping the destruction and raping." They have bills to pay after all.
But you are quite right that neither First Nations or the corporate elite care about the rest of us except as tax-payers to be milked or culled.
Sask Resident
2 years ago
Already a Pipeline
How many people know that a natural gas pipeline already runs from Alberta to Kitimat (to the now-shut Methanex plant).
Ships hauled bauxite ore in and ethylene out of Kitimat for years (over 50 for ore) with few problems. Also, ships have continued to haul crude oil from Alaska along the BC coast for the last 21 years. The sinking and operation of BC Ferries have caused more problems.
If Enbridge pumps regular crude from BC and Alberta, would that be OK. Or is the misplaced complaints due to the oil sands?
Sask Resident
2 years ago
Curt - Honest Living
If the Canadian energy industries everyone hates were to shut down (oil, nat gas, coal) would you, me, or the next guy be able to go to work every day and make an "honest" living? How many of the BC jobs rely on the resource industry? The oil industry is estimated to provide a million jobs in Ontario, the same as Alberta and Sask combined. 1/4 of the provincial government pay roll relies on the energy industry.