This dam conference on hydro-impacted communities starts today! It's actually named "Ki Ta Ski Naw" or 'rise up' in Cree. For those interested in following along, I think hashtags will be #hydroimpacted #hydrojustice & I'll also try to use #SiteC #bcpoli hydroimpacted.ca/conference-age…
Looking forward to the first panel which will be moderated by BC journalist @sarahcox_bc. Opening welcome now. Starting to regain feeling in my face from the walk here, hi Winnipeg!
We're in Treaty 1 territory for the #hydroimpacted conference. Welcome by local elder Dave Scott in Cree language. Speaking now about the treaty relationship, its history, the 'doctine of discovery', Trudeau's White Paper & ongoing devolution process.. cc #SiteC #treaty8
"The environment today is under attack by industry and governments. Hydroelectric dams disproportionately affect Indigenous peoples worldwide. #SiteC #bcpoli #cdnpoli #MuskratFalls #Keeyask #hydroimpacted #hydrojustice
The #hydroimpacted conference has previously alwys been held in the North; this is the first time it's been held in the south (Winnipeg). This time there are many attendees from across Canada and the word. #mbpoli #bcpoli #SiteC #muskratfalls #cdnpoli
Wa Ni Ska Tan ("Rise Up") is an alliance of Hydro Impacted Communities in Manitoba and it's hosting this conference here in Winnipeg which was traditionally a gathering place for Indigenous nations. Talking about environmental, social, cultural impacts of the hydro industry.
The Wa Ni Ska Tan group started by leading hydro tours throughout Manitoba - this is something we should organize in BC to see the impacts of Hydro in the Peace River Valley and beyond? #SiteC
PS I am enjoying the sheer number of times speakers have mentioned that there are a lot of troublemakers in the room, from Manitoba and beyond. Take note @JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan #SieC #MuskratFalls #hydroimpacted
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan First panel is moderated by BC journalist @sarahcox_bc: "From #SiteC through Keeyask to #Muskrat Falls." Talking to audience members from Sweden, India, US, S. America and across Canada... #bcpoli #hydroimpacted
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc Sarah Cox: "It's often a lonely slog fighting hydro projects so it's nice to see so many troublemakers in one room." Says #SiteC, #Keeyask and "MuskratFalls dams are the terrible triplets, in common: overbudget, attack on environment, & profound impact on Indigenous communities
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc Connie Greyeyes, Cree from Fort St John. "The #SiteC dam is 7 km from my front door... we are already feeling the effects of this project from workers coming in, specif. on women and girls" And most don't understand that these projects drive up prices of everything -> poverty
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc "When the dam is unnecessary, and already so overbudget, the economic stress is further increased. There are already 2 dams on our river and this is just unnecessary." Esp when we have an energy surprlus. #SitEC #bcpoli
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc Denise Cole of @protectlabrador, talking about dams on the Churchill River in Labrador" Churchill R. is the colonial name. 7th largest river in Canada. "Colonial govts don't want to listen to us who live downstream. I'm 30 km downstream from #MuskratFalls, built in rushed way
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "So many geological problems with #MuskratFalls - when you rush projects like this, Mother Nature has a way of hitting back" Sound familiar, BC? "We are dealing with methylmercury fallout" #SiteC #bcpoli #nlpoli #cdnpoli
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador What is the balance when colonial govts make deals with some not with others, consult with some not with others.. They made an agreement containing mistakes and now methylmercury will be coming downstream to 10,000 of us downstream. #SiteC is a mirror reflection of #MuskratFalls
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Denise Cole: both #SiteC and #MuskratFalls are strikingly similar dealing with unstable mud substrate. Unsafe not to mention that building on this material is difficult hence expensive. #bcpoli
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Elder from Split Lake talking about how clear & drinkable their water used to be. "Now we can turn on the light anytime, but the ease of that comes w/ terrible damage to our water. Before you could see into depths. Today you can't even see your hand under the water it's so dirty.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Yes, Hydro makes money out of it, but in the same breath they destroy us. There is so much destruction in my community now, every time I think about it I want to cry. With the dams comes drugs, alcohol, marriage breakups, discrimination. Human destructions the dams cause"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Then there's what they put into the water, the poison that's making us sick... But we can't destroy the water anymore. As a woman I advocate for the water, because without it no one would be here. Hydro doesn't think about this. We need to work together to preserve our water"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Our water used to be clear. Now it looks like mud. We used to be able to go to the beach, catch fish, but no longer. The fish are being destroyed, the animals are being destroyed, their migration routes are screwed up, they're confused. Mother Nature is fighting back"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "There's so much destruction going on at #Keeyask dam. our young ones who go to work there, they're looked down on, and it's their land being destroyed. They're used as slaves, not trained for later work. It's destroying our communities. We didn't have this when I was a girl."
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Richard Spence, Indigenous water and land protector: "back home we can’t even drink our own water,
something i thought i’d never see in my lifetime. Do not swim signs due to e coli, our children can't swim in our own water. Kids breaking out with rashes after a bath. So dirty.
something i thought i’d never see in my lifetime. Do not swim signs due to e coli, our children can't swim in our own water. Kids breaking out with rashes after a bath. So dirty.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Manitoba Hydro tells you that the energy is "green." The water is green all right... not the right green." The megaproject brings drugs into the community. Everything in the community stems from the water - once good, now in a bad way. "Every time I hear the word dev't I cringe"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Richard Spence "With the devt of #Keeyask dam, it has brought social changes. I am one very pissed off individual. My son is 16, but his mental capacity isn't what it used to be, from drugs. "Dev't, partnership agreements - that's just dam's happening, take this deal or leave it"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Development. It has its pros and cons. But I'm never goign to asccep what #Keeyask has done. Our ancestors have their remains strewn all over this land but they treat us like beggars asking for handouts. We are not beggars; we are only asking to protect what is sacred to us"
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "When I come to board rooms in the south, what I see happening there is not right - how are we supposed to live with the consequences of what southern politicians decide? They have no idea what they are doing."
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Sarah Cox: all 3 govts for the 3 mega-dams in Canada say they have consulted with FN, got Free Prior & Informed Consent (FPIC). How to square that away with what we are hearing here? In light of govt's 'commitment' to UNDRIP & Reconciliation. #SiteC #bcpoli #MuskratFalls #Keeyask
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Elder from Manitoba (will find name spelling) detailing the 'consultation' and negotiation - backed into a corner, and then they have to sign NDAs so they can't talk about what happened in that rigged negotiation. "Consultation." But most of the time we were ostracized."
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "I remember so clearly the day #Keeyask dam was signed. We were outside protesting. The govt studied animals, but never did a health impact assessment, other impacts. I work for medical services; I see the impacts of the dam."
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "They studied the mice, the rodents, the birds... but not the impact on our communities, our children.. I have nightmares, they haunt me. I've had to take anti-depressants. Where are our children going to get water? We fought, but we were ostracized, threatened."
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador "Now the pipeline is coming - we know what they are preparing for. The agreement they signed was 100 man-years of employment, but that evaporates - if they hire and fire you, that's 1 man year. Some take the jobs because they need the money. But what have we done?
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Connie Greyeyes. They tell FN you'll get jobs - but they don't tell you that you'll be shovelling, cleaning toilets. In our case, West Moberly FN and Prophet R FN are fighting BC Hydro, but some nations signed agreements because they are living in poverty; you can't blame them.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Connie Greyeyes: But you can't have meaningful consultation when one side is unwilling to mitigate serious consequences. I've seen the consequences in Manitoba to women & girls when megaprojects come in w/ camps. And to men. Racism, exploitation. Consultation: a word they use.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Connie Greyeyes: when they come in to "consult" and say it's going ahead and you can sign or not, that's not consultation, that's bullying. There's no real consultation on mitigating impacts." #SiteC #bcpoli #keeyask #muskratfalls #FPIC #UNDRIP #mbpoli #nlpoli
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Richard Spence: "consultation: I hear that word and I think lawyers and consultation hidden away in rooms in southern Manitoba... My wife and I barged into one #Keeyask consultation - I asked where did the Phase 1 & 2 consultation go, how can we be at Phase 3? Underhanded, hidden
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Richard Spence: "Backroom deals, dirty politics. Some of our people secretly took cheques too - but that's not real consultation, it has to be taken to the grassroots people. As chiefs they're our bosses." Projects are gaming, sidestepping this.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Richard Spence telling a story about how the "consultation" happened for #Keeyask. Too detailed to keep up with here but it's just one dirty trick and sidestep after another. When he hears "consultation" it's just consultants and lawyers in nice rooms #SiteC #MuskratFalls #UNDRIP
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Denise Cole wrapping up: Be careful of their UNDRIP talk. They'll use it to put laws in place to be able to continue doing what they're doing. Talking about dealing with RCMP during the injunction at #MuskratFalls.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Denise Cole: the trails that are gone, the graves, the artifacts taken. How many in this room every gave your free, prior & informed consent to these projects (no hands raised). We did everything humanly possible to stop #MuskratFalls but they found their loopholes & went ahead.
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Elder: as soon as we show any signs of strength, they're afraid. The more we work together, the more they're going to stop destroying our land, our waters and our children." #cdnpoli #SiteC #bcpoli #MuskratFalls #Keeyask #hydro
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Now Q&A: Q for Connie Greyeyes on #SiteC: "what are you doing to raise awareness, kids at school, sharing with other Indig. communities, collectively?" Connie: I work on bringing #MMIWG element into school curriculum, including working with young men. #bcpoli
@JustinTrudeau @jjhorgan @sarahcox_bc @protectlabrador Connie Greyeyes: we have 10,000 people who come into the community who make $3K in 2 weeks then go into town for entertainment, and our women and girls are unsafe. Stranger rape stories. #SiteC #bcpoli
Richard Spence of Split Lake - 'we live in the toilet bowl of the north, on the Nelson River, we drink your sewage from the south... We have bought a plane in our community to get our kids and members away from the damage.' #Keeyask dam #mbpoli #bcpoli #SiteC #MuskratFalls
End of panel - will resume when @WinonaLaduke starts her keynote speech soon.
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke beginning her keynote speech at #kitaskinaw2019 conference - speaking about how dams killed the sturgeon her people depended on. Also showing work by @christibelcourt #SiteC #keeyask #MuskratFalls #bcpoli #hydroimpacted
@WinonaLaduke talking about extractive ownership - Canada has an economic plan but it's not an economic plan for survival, but constant extraction. You can't talk about climate change and expert to grow the tar sands. "I spent 7 years fighting Enbridge." #SiteC
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke "Half our land is water, and much of it is dammed." And now that there's no easy oil anymore, we have to do more invasive projects like fracking and tar sands that destroy a lot of land and water. "I call it Windigo economics" #kitaskinaw2019 #SiteC #cdnpoli
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke Talking about suing Enbridge in a time when tar sands are dying. 10% less production, & Koch bros sold their tar sands assets 2 mos ago, taking losses. It's the dirtiest oil in the world. Canadian corp Enbridge's line 3 passes @WinonaLaduke's MN home #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke and community stood in front of Enbridge and stopped its project in Minnesota. Enbridge financed 28% of #DAPL, which was diverted to cross Indigenous (not white) lands on purpose. Enbridge has never accounted for the brutality.
@WinonaLaduke "But corps own the govt - not that Canada hasn't been a corporation from the beginning. But corps should not have the rights of a person" - @WinonaLaduke #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke “the best way to protest is to stand on your horse” (laughs, audience laughs). "I’ve spent my whole life stopping stupid ideas, mostly from white people.” #kitaskinaw2019 
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke talking about "8th Fire Solar," the solar project on her reservation, one that faces fuel poverty. Propane heat. "With climate change, the grid will go down, so they need local power - we all need to, that's what sovereignty looks like." No fancy. #kitaskinaw2019
“We now put these up in our community and we sell them to other communities” a community saying we could freeze and be fearful, or do this”
@WinonaLaduke: There is no reason to have fossil fuels out in our territory, when we have wind and lots of sun. But we have to lead it. "You're either at the table, or you're on the menu. And we have to set the table." #Solar #cdnpoli #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: Another idea: a proposal to electrify the rail lines in the US and you should do that in Canada. We could rebuild the backbone of rail. Combustion engines are 16% efficient, electric 65% efficient. Metal on metal better than rubber on road. #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: Canada is driving climate change; it's a disaster emissions-wise. I am fighting one Canadian/Cdn-backed company after another working around our lands in Minnesota. #kitaskinaw2019 #cdnpoli
Solar array in the US, on a reservation.
@WinonaLaduke talking about rights legally given to rivers (NZ), land, and among her people, the wild rice of her people/territory. #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: In my area, many of our wild rice areas were flooded out by both dams & cottagers. They flooded out our rice. We have started to reclaim it - and the rice comes back. But now I grow fibre hemp; I want to transform materials economy (Manitoba produces a lot of hemp)
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: The word "canvas" comes from "cannabis." - I heard there was a conspiracy by fossil fuels, Henry Ford and Levi Strauss meant the choice was between a hydrocarbon economy and a carbohydrate economy. Hemp vs Suncor. Wrong choice.
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: Hemp far more sustainable fibre than cotton and certainly than synthetics. People wnat to make a killing on CBD but we need to change the world, to develop fibre to change the world's materials economy. You can make hempcrete, cars, anything out of it.
@WinonaLaduke The hemp fibre industry was systematically destroyed in N. America - we have to forensically figure it out again. Minnesota had 11 hemp mills before 1940 - we need to reboot those. Hemp grows without chemicals. We need ethical manufacturing - including labour wise.
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: so that is what we are doing: solar, electrification, hemp. We're changing the world... Don't treat a plant like a slave and it will do better...The new economy will be built on cooperation not competition or exploitation. #kitaskinaw2019
@WinonaLaduke @WinonaLaduke: What I am saying to you is: step out of line. If you want to survive, step out of line. We despair what has happened to our water, but we must be water protectors. Be water protectors. #kitaskinaw2019 #SiteC #Keeyask #MuskratFalls #cdnpoli
@WinonaLaduke Session: "Mapping conflict and resistance against dams with the EJAtlas, Daniela Del Bene, ENVJustice project, Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. ejatlas.org; geocomunes.org #kitaskinaw2019 #SiteC #bcpoli #MuskratFalls
@WinonaLaduke Her Environmental Justice group has a de-growth orientation, and coordinates with groups involved in energy sovereignty (solar, wind, small scale biomass), some involved in dam resistance - they coordinate regularly with other groups. Booklet: "We've Got Energy" #kitaskinaw2019
Daniela Del Bene
The ENVJustice mapping project also maps the relationship between the site of extraction to the site of consumption of resource or energy, and who benefits.. "Socio-metabolic perspective." For more info see @EnvJustice #SiteC #MuskratFalls #Keeyask #bcpoli #cdnpoli
Useful list of resources for database, but the problem is that it lacks the local stories of resistance, so the idea is to crowd source that
So the idea is to find ways to collaborate or provide means of collaboration between groups of resisters/land protectors #SiteC
@EnvJustice Fascinating story of successful resistance by a valley in Albania, who argued against a dam project they didn't need and argued for more ecologically sound projects.
@EnvJustice aims - preventive resistance and info sharing, counter hegemonic memories... #kitaskinaw2019 #sitec
@EnvJustice Q&A? Can compensation even happen at all? The damage is so total, how do you compensate for that? Useful to compare countries in this - to show that compensation is very problematic if possible at all. Marguerite/Moose Lank saying they want the land back; not to own but share
Q from floor: can you track one company on the map? Yes - here's a preliminary map of Chevron projects that are being resisted (there are complexities of course, shell companies, hidden actors, financial capital)
And here’s the map of controversial projects of the Vale mining company whose dam failures have caused deaths in the Amazon
There are anti-dam activists from Brazil are here at the #hydroimpacted #kitaskinaw2019 conference, talking about how to connect activist and academic work internationally (including language barrier issue). Also dam activists from Mexico, Panama, Sweden, many other places
Now at "Activist Movement of Latin America: Dam Resistance" panel, on dam resistance in the global south and north & how to connect them up. Elisa Estronioli from Brazil up first from Movimento dos Atingidos por Baraggens. #kitaskinaw2019 @HydroImpacted #SiteC @resistmegadams
Elisa Estronioli talking about how energy rates went up in Brazil once the gov't privatized energy. Don't believe the hype on the efficiencies of the market...And now on dams we fight not only the govt but also the corporations #cartel #kitaskinaw2019
"We hear your problems in Canada with fake consultation, but in Brazil, with corporations, we have no consultation at all now. All the rights we have we've fought for but they never fully become law, so it has to be fought over and over... #kitaskinaw2019
Elisa talking about the dam she's fighting in her area, MegaProyecto Hidroeléctrico Belo Monte. As with the Canadian stories this morning, she's talking about the crime, drugs, deaths, violence that come into regions with hydro dams.
Meanwhile rivers have dried out & those living on its banks, making a living there, have had to move out. It's not climate change creating these enviro'l refugees; it's private dams producing migrants, very many in Brazilian Amazon. [40-80m worldwide in last decade(s) I believe]
Lakes in Brazil are being emptied out too. Everything is accelerating under the current govt [Bolsonaro], who has willingly demolished environmental regulation. -> increased persecution/killings of land and water protectors.
"Now the need is to strengthen the local struggles by connecting up with regional and national and international level" (this is becoming a theme at this conference). Hooking up with working class & women's movements in Brazil.
They are connecting up with communities affected by dams. [President Lula was released from prison today - there was applause] But there's contradictions with Lula; one of the biggest dams was built by his govt. But it's still a good sign & now it's time to push newer energy.
Elisa: "We don't want any more predatory energy systems. We want to transform the social life and economy of Brazil, moving away from the profit motive. Now to next presenter.
@ISAZULETA is up now - I heard her speak in Vancouver on Nov. 1. She's fighting the Ituango dam in Colombia, along with a movement of women and Indigenous land protectors, who are subject to state violence over their resistance.
@ISAZULETA So many displaced for a dam that wasn't necessary. As Isabel Cristina noted the other night, this project is not an energy project; it's a political project. In this it has a lot in common with #SiteC (also in common is the geotechnical instability - huge landslides)
@ISAZULETA If you say you belong to the Rios Vivos movement in Colombia, you are likely to disappear. And they're not compensated; govt makes people move and then says why compensate them when they're moving anyway. (Showing pics of assassinated community leaders)
@ISAZULETA And the Colombian govt has been able to build this dam with loans from Quebec and Canada, billions worth. So we here are complicit in the environmental damage, violence, assassinations and displacement. #bcpoli #quebec #cdnpoli #SiteC
Please visit riosvivoscolombia.org if you want to help their fight - donate or buy merch and spread the word! Thanks @ISAZULETA
@ISAZULETA Last on panel: Shannon Chief, Odiskwagami Anishnabe water and land protector. Her people live along the river that crosses between Ontario and Quebec. On doing the work of documenting traditions & keeping them alive as well as connecting with groups in latin america
Shannon talking about going to Panama for a conference on dams/extraction and indigenous peoples & hearing about the damage inflicted in Central America by Canadian companies - just like on her own land in Canada.
Talking about how to organize - local, social groups - to regional - to international. Making an interesting observation about how so often the women organize and the men aren't clear on their role - she's saying the men "need to be led by mother earth" and reconnect with her.
"Nothing scares a corporation more than people from the grassroots coming together." Shannon Chief talking about Indigenous solidarity from North to Central to S America. Identify the mining, forestry, dam corps.. Canada does 70% of mining down there #SiteC #MuskratFalls #Keeyask
Interesting visualization of organization strategies and processes that borrows from cultural imagery - as a means of describing the solidarity and connections between Indigenous peoples in North and South
Now @ISAZULETA talking about going to Montreal next to protest outside Quebec Pension Plan offices - it has invested in the dam destroying the land of her people. End of panel! Will resume tomorrow. /
Topical on day 2 of #kitaskinaw2019 dam conference: @guardian "Poorly planned Amazon dam project Belo Monte 'poses serious threat to life' - Operator faces choice of weakening 14km barrier or potentially devastating a biodiversity hotspot" #SiteC theguardian.com/environment/20…
@guardian Devastating plenary address this morning, detailing the brutality of colonization and its extraction/dev't, including dams. People crying. "Like Water for Justice," Deepa Joshi, Hon. Research Fellow, Coventry. #genocide #SiteC #Keeyask #MuskratFalls #kitaskinaw2019 #UNDRIP
@guardian These brutal stories of extreme dislocation & terrorization of peoples, often marginalized +/or Indigenous, for the devt of hydropower must be told. It's so often a political project, incl. corporate welfare. Yet even UN still touting hydro as climate mitigation #kitaskinaw2019
@guardian Joshi, who grew up in Sikkim w a relationship to the Teesta R (now dammed) talking about India's pursuit of so many dams - even in seismic areas - when they were not needed. We are hearing this story over and over - it's not energy needs driving these dams. #kitaskinaw2019
Deepa Joshi joking that maybe Trump was right to opt out of the Paris Agreement if it contains bad hydro and climate policy like this, when dams are neither climate friendly or just: #kitaskinaw2019 #sitec @HydroImpacted #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted Deepa Joshi now describing in compelling detail how the damming of some of these rivers will inevitably result in the extinguishment of whole peoples and their culture, like the Lepcha people of Sikkim. #kitaskinaw2019 #hydrogenocide
Sat. plenary panel: Internat'l Resistance to Hydro Devt, w/
Elisa Estronioli, Brazilian Movt of Communities
Affected by Dams;
Jonathan Gonzales Quiel, Autonomous Univ. of Chiriquí, Nat'l Network in Defense of Water in Panama;
Marie-Éve Marleau, Cttee for Human Rights in Latin Am.
Elisa Estronioli, Brazilian Movt of Communities
Affected by Dams;
Jonathan Gonzales Quiel, Autonomous Univ. of Chiriquí, Nat'l Network in Defense of Water in Panama;
Marie-Éve Marleau, Cttee for Human Rights in Latin Am.
For those just joining this livetweet of #kitaskinaw2019, an international conference on dams in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, here is the conference host's website with link to the agenda: hydroimpacted.ca #bcpoli #cdnpoli hydroimpacted.ca #SiteC #muskratfalls
Elisa Estronioli: speaking of international context of a global crisis of capitalism & battle for supremacy between US & China, which plays out in Latin America. As capital seeks projects to exit the crisis, it seeks new resources, impacting marginalized in countries like Brazil
Elisa Estronioli: "we are not only facing the Brazilian govt but private corps, esp financial capitalism. As in Canada, most of the power is in hydro plants, considered cheaper energy than nuclear etc. Yet Brazilians pay very high rates for electricity while corps benefit
Elisa Estronioli: Our increasingly internationally connected movement is beginning to ask: "electricity for whom?" The idea that hydropower is "clean energy" is problematic in itself (it's not) but the fact is we can't have clean energy in a dirty system. #kitaskinaw2019 #cdnpoli
The theme this morning, as throughout the whole conference, has been that the boom in hydroelectric dam devt globally has nothing to do with power needs but with the needs of capital, & states (and captured peoples) are complicit. WE're destroying rivers & ecosystems for profit.
"Women, water and energy are not commodities."
Next: Jonathan Gonzales Quiel, Autonomous Univ. of Chiriquí, Nat'l Network in Defense of Water in Panama. (Showing slide of the water protector Berta Caceres who was murdered in Honduras.) Dams began as a state vision in Panama in the 80s, a vision that began in Mexico.
Jonathan Gonzales Quiel: he's talking about the corporate actors behind the dams - so his talk is in line with everything else we've heard this weekend: the same companies who are financing these "projects of death." We have started to visualize these enemies in our region:
Mapping the dams and corporate actors behind them in Panama: #kitaskinaw2019
Now talking about the 39,000 US troops who have moved through the Central Am region; Berta Caceres was murdered by US trained local troops, in aid of extractivism. With dams you can clear local populations out of resource rich regions. Again: no clean energy in a dirty system
But the people are startling to decide they’ve had enough. But it’s not just about fighting neoliberalism. The media has made the struggles of Indigenous peoples. But they are organizing, at home and in Canada
Marie-Éve Marleau, Cttee for Human Rights in Latin Am, a solidarity group based in Montreal. (She has also been translating for @ISAZULETA during this conference). Talking about how current extractivism incl dams is reproducing some of the impacts of early colonization #cdnpoli
Next: @ISAZULETA of @RiosVivosColom from Ituango, Colombia, whom we've heard from before in this livetweet. She's fighting a destructive mega-dam in Colombia that's partly financed by Canada & Quebec pension plan. The first fight in their movement is for existence #hidroituango
@ISAZULETA @RiosVivosColom "I was born in the midst of the war, civil conflict, bombs dropping..." Corporate interests benefit from the war. Now we don't have any hopes to return to our land which has been flooded and destroyed. Most of our people are sick.
Our govt said they'd give people land if they didn't oppose the dam. The real problem for them is our opposition, without it there is no conflict. Now that the dam is already built, how do we continue to oppose it? Now we are demanding they take the dam down & liberate the river
Because we cannot make sense of our lives without the river. Our fight is not just to stop dams but to dismantle the dams and liberate the rivers. They knew they were building in a seismic area and they ignored it; they said they had enough knowledge to dominate the earth
Today the dam is unstable and starting to collapse. We don't need academic extractivism. We need the dam to come down. The dam isn't even economic now. The point of the dam isn't economic or energy; it's political control of us, our minds, & destruction of our opposition.
..."159 cadavers were found when they inundated our region; but many more are missing. They want to control us. That's what capitalism wants." [standing ovation] / #kitaskinaw2019 #cdnpoli @RiosVivosColom @ISAZULETA #SiteC #cdnpoli #hydropower #UNDRIP
@RiosVivosColom @ISAZULETA Q&A: Marguerite, Indigenous woman from near Grand Rapids N. Manitoba - living downstream from a dam that they've been warned is unstable. Our communities were ruined by dams, yet we are poor; many in our communities have had our hydro cut off. #irony #cdnpoli
@RiosVivosColom @ISAZULETA ...'The dams have dispossessed our people from the land [she is speaking through crying]. We want them down... We are no longer in control of our own lives.' She is hoping for connection with the other fights against hydropower politics along w this fracking, oil spills, mining
'The world doesn't know what's going on in Canada., the extractivist destruction. But we need to identify the corporations and individuals behind these projects.'
Jonathan: 'we too want to blow up our hydrolectric projects!' (laughs) (laughter across room). One project he's fighting is a mining project (so often somehow connected to dams) has (not surprisingly) some Canadian corporate involvement.
Q: Carol from @HydroImpacted from N. Manitoba - her people are supposedly part owners of a hydro dam and there's supposedly revenue sharing but it's not panning out. "It's now in the hole and our people are going to end up with nothing. The govt must be accountable for this."
@HydroImpacted Now the panel has been asked to comment on how solidarity and organization between all our struggles can be developed going forward. Jonathan: "Our first job is to go home to communities & share what's happened here, to bring hope. We see now we're not alone"
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA "I came here looking for hope. I don't want my people to see all Canadians as destroyers of hope in my country. I knew there had to be good people in Canada and I came here and found them. There are Canadian co's in my area using dam dev't to get hold of gold"
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA "They took our land and homes, told us that we should be happy with the food the govt is handing out, that fish should not longer be free, we should be happy with the farm fish they give us, but it tastes like dirt. But if it's not free it's not worth eating"
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA "But I have learned here about dams that have been dismantled, it's a joy to see the fish recover and return. .. But I return to my country now with hope that we can dismantle our dam and restore our land"
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA Lunch! Not sure which sessions I'll be going to this afternoon but would like to hear Connie Greyeyes talking about the effect of dam man camps on #MMIWG #UNDRIP
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA "Our Voices Together in Trauma & Resilience - Sharing Stories of Gendered Violence of Resource Development"
Louisa Constant, Martina Saunders, & Hilda Anderson-Pyrz from York Factory First Nation, MB; and Connie Greyeyes, Fort St. John, BC. #SiteC #MMIWG @manitobahydro #bcpoli
Louisa Constant, Martina Saunders, & Hilda Anderson-Pyrz from York Factory First Nation, MB; and Connie Greyeyes, Fort St. John, BC. #SiteC #MMIWG @manitobahydro #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted @ISAZULETA @manitobahydro Martina Saunders from Treaty 5, York Factory FN, was a negotiator for her nation in hydro/env't hearings. Talking about her people being forcibly removed from their territory and moved to York Landing, & seeing both the ecological & social/cultural impacts, esp on women/LGBTQ
@HydroImpacted ..Martina: Strong relationship between sexual violence and hydroelectric projects. As time went on, the already poor relationship with Manitoba Hydro deteriorated & now is nonexistent. Now fighting tooth and nail to get anything from @manitobahydro. #kitaskinaw2019
@HydroImpacted @manitobahydro Martina: because of remoteness, traveling to meet w Hydro or for community/employment needs is difficult, over ice in winter or small plane weather permitting, so the removal has lasting deleterious effects. If worker late for a nearby job, loses all seniority or gets fired
@HydroImpacted Martina: I resigned from negotiations on board dealing with Hydro due to the bullying, gaslighting, racism, humiliation - couldn't handle it anymore. "I felt my spirit was pushed into the ground." #kitaskinaw2019 #SiteC #manitobahydro #MuskratFalls
@HydroImpacted Martina: there are few ways to deal with the rampant sexual violence and harassment on the Hydro projects (often housekeeping work). Women assaulted have to go to her direct boss to report it - even if he's the abuser. True at dams & resource extraction generally in N. Man.
@HydroImpacted Martina: "The women are the backbone of our communities. We need to protect them. The impacts are serious; you live with it for the rest of your life, you may get into addiction and are lost, separated from your community" And it's dangerous; we all know about #MMIWG. #mbpoli
@HydroImpacted ..Connie Greyeyes from Fort St John, talking about her cousin who was killed which began her work against #MMIWG. She was stapling names of victims to an Amnesty International banner which started a long relationship with @amnestynow, working with @Craig_Benjamin. #SiteC #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin Connie Greyeyes talking about @jjhorgan and #BCNDP campaigning against #SITEC while BC liberals are in power but then betraying us by passing #SiteC & saying it was past point of no return. "You feel beaten down. But.. if you do not work in resource industry you live in poverty"
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan The poverty also means staying in abusive relationships because you can't afford to leave. Then there's the man camps, with thousands of transient workers. But it's no surprise most of the promises of work for locals evaporated; airports full of incoming workers" #SiteC #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan Connie: people from other countries come to the north to work because they're trained, but Hydro/industry doesn't train locals. Connie knows the work sites through her work as a medic, and has been assaulted herself. Every day I look in the mirror & see the scars of it.
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan Connie resisted an assault in Fort St John while out one night, and was punched in the face by an assaulter; had to go to hospital for cut lip and damaged teeth; RCMP didn't take a statement "because you've been drinking." #SiteC #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan Next: Jackie Hanson fromo @AmnestyNow based in Ottawa. Too often there's talk about enviro damage from hydro & resource dev't, but not about human rights, about people. It's a different lens & opens doors to diff tools to hold govts, crown corps & corps accountable #sitec #bcpoli
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan Jackie Hansen: @AI_WomenRights: You can't say that this happens in all resource devt; it's never right. Looking at gender impacts is a different lens helps us understand power & how different groups are impacted differently. Many reports on impacts are gender blind. #SiteC
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights @AI_WomenRights: this lens can alter the way project assessment is done - there is a federal framework for looking at gender-based impacts, but often not provincial though BC has one [not that it's put into operation but that's another issue]. Govt & industry initially resist..
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights @AI_WomenRights: When specifics on mitigation of impacts are given to industry/govt though, like on the ground methods to protect women, processes, rape kits, it there's more buy-in. But we need federal and provincial monitoring to make sure they're protecting human rights.
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights Women are more likely to be stigmatized in political work than men and there are very real security threats specific to women around resource devt. But we can't say generally "there's always violence in resource devt." Not good enough, and also too non specific. #kitaskinaw2019
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights Q from Deepa Joshi: There;s a culture of masculinity that pervades across the hydro industry, so there is a massive need for changing attitudes & culture across the industry. But can you even have an inclusive hydropower/extractive industry? Gender goes far deeper than inclusion.
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights Next: "Megadams=Megadamage: Building US/Canadian Alliances Centred on Grassroots
Resistance." Introd'd by Angela Giles, Atlantic Reg'l Organizer @CouncilofCDNs.
Denise Cole, Labrador Land Protectors; Meg Sheehan of @resistmegadams, Roberta Frampton-Benefiel, Labrador Riverkeeper
Resistance." Introd'd by Angela Giles, Atlantic Reg'l Organizer @CouncilofCDNs.
Denise Cole, Labrador Land Protectors; Meg Sheehan of @resistmegadams, Roberta Frampton-Benefiel, Labrador Riverkeeper
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights @CouncilofCDNs @resistmegadams Meg Sheehan of @resistmegadams: state govt removing bad dams in Massachussetts but then bringing in dirty power from #muskratfalls. So she contacted @protectlabrador & @JustinBrakeNews & others to fight #MuskratFalls. It's not "clean energy" though. #kitaskinaw2019
@HydroImpacted @AmnestyNow @Craig_Benjamin @jjhorgan @AI_WomenRights @CouncilofCDNs @resistmegadams @protectlabrador @JustinBrakeNews So Massachusetts is not meeting its own climate/enviro goals if it's importing dirty energy from Canada. See slide in next tweet.
Meg: so we had to ask, Where is this hydro power coming from? Is it clean? Why is it being exported? #muskratfalls
This is an excellent example of US-Canada cooperation against
destructive mega-dams. Now many US NE states are growing more aware of the damage from dams and @resistmegadams is connecting these cross-border groups up with each other. #SiteC #Keeyask #MuskratFalls #cdnpoli
destructive mega-dams. Now many US NE states are growing more aware of the damage from dams and @resistmegadams is connecting these cross-border groups up with each other. #SiteC #Keeyask #MuskratFalls #cdnpoli
@resistmegadams Their banner reads UNITE & RESIST!
@resistmegadams Next up: Denise Cole of @protectlabrador on their fight against the #muskratfalls mega-dam and how they started connecting up to @intlrivers, activists like Matthew Behrens, and then started sitting in resistance at projects.
@resistmegadams @protectlabrador @intlrivers "There's the political work, the activist work & the heart work and it's the heart work that keeps us going." So they built a cross-Canada solidary group to oppose #MuskratFalls, joined up with Angela at @CouncilofCDNs... "wherever we could hit them politically, we hit them."
@resistmegadams @protectlabrador @intlrivers @CouncilofCDNs Denise Cole: "Then we found out these mega-dams were happening elsewhere to, and we joined up with @EcoLawMeg & @resistdams and the larger "MegaDamage" group. In Labrador, we used social media, and we used our hearts to talk to other people's hearts, and that's how we built this"
Roberta Frampton-Benefiel, longtime activist (decades of work) against the #MuskratFalls dam in Labrador. When she first got involved, she realized some of the Nfld govt studies were cut & pasted from Quebec Hydro.
Roberta Benefiel: 550,000 will pay for the #MuskratFalls dam, when we don't need all that power. The rest will be sold to the US if dam ever comes online (they're having difficulty with it). When locals realized they were going to pay, they went berserk. 65 cents a kilowatt/hour!
Denise Cole: we need to start scrutinizing corps like #SNCLavalin which is one of the engineering firms building dams but also has the cleanup contracts - we have to start identifying these actors. Who are they, who's the money going to - who are the human faces behind it.
Rita from northern Manitoba - says she says to her people "Hydro and the corps owe us so much for the losses and damage - so don't pay your hydro bills - invoice @manitobahydro for the damage!" #Keeyask dam #BCHydro #SiteC #MuskratFalls #mbpoli
@manitobahydro As soon as our mega-dams come online, ratepayers have to start paying. Eg Manitoba ratepayers will have to pay about 14 cents/kilowatt hour. Most of the energy will be exported to the US, which now pays Cdn utilities about 4 cents/kwr. Guess who pays the diff? #bcpoli #SiteC
Now we are breaking into small groups, to talk about opportunities to broaden the water protector/ dam resistance movement, and to talk about what support small groups need.
Elizabeth Penashue, Innu elder from Goose Bay, Labrador, talking about the ecological and human impacts of the #MuskratFalls mega-dam in Labrador, and about the years of pain they have experienced over this project, destroying their land. #kitaskinaw2019 #TheDamTruth
Penashue: "I've very sad about what the government has done to our land. Sometimes I cry when I go to #MuskratFalls and see what the dam has done. I have worked so hard to protect the land, the animals & the children... Showing the children the long river to be buried by the dam"
Innu elder Elizabeth Penashue: "My English is not very good, but everything I say is with my heart. I worked so hard [against #MuskratFalls dam], walked all the way t0 Ottawa, ended up in jail with my people (for protesting the dam). I was in jail I don't know how many times"...
"I walk [against the #MuskratFalls dam] because I am trying to make the road, making a path for the children to follow after me." Penashue's daughter: now the dam reservoir is being filled & the river is too dangerous to canoe on. It's so sad to see the trees underwater" #cdnpoli
..."Now that we see the trees submerged in the reservoir, we really understand what our parents were warning us about." - daughter of Innu elder Elizabeth Penashue.
“Violence against Indigenous lands is violence against Indigenous people”
T-shirts at #kitaskinaw2019 @HydroImpacted conference in Winnipeg #siteC #bcpoli #muskratfalls #keeyask #mbpoli @resistmegadams
T-shirts at #kitaskinaw2019 @HydroImpacted conference in Winnipeg #siteC #bcpoli #muskratfalls #keeyask #mbpoli @resistmegadams
