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Bridge blockers oppose gas line project

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Demonstrators backing Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs opposing a natural gas pipeline in British Columbia are blocking an entrance used by most traffic heading southbound on the International Bridge.

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A Nissan Sentra was parked at the bridge’s entrance on Huron Street early Monday afternoon. A teepee went up in a nearby parking lot at the Canadian customs plaza Monday night.

Southbound traffic can use a truck entrance on Carmen’s Way and continue to Michigan.

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Candice Day Neveau, speaking to reporters on Tuesday morning, described the small group as Indigenous land defenders who stand in “solidarity” with “our brothers and sisters” who belong to the western Canadian First Nation. Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs oppose a 670-kilometre Coastal GasLink underground pipeline in northern B.C. that would carry natural gas between Dawson Creek and Kitmat. Twenty First Nations along the pipeline, five of them Wet’suwet’en, back the project. Some hereditary chiefs are opposed.

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“They’re setting a good example for the rest of Indigenous people here on Turtle Island,” said Neveau. “We’re shutting down Canada and we want Canada back.”

Day Neveau calls developments, such as Coastal GasLink, “a direct violation of our human rights.

“We’re here to say, no more,” she said. “For the last 500 years we’ve been pushed around. But Indigenous people have a voice. Everyone’s well-educated now – enough to be able to know that this is wrong.”

Day Neveau  describes elected leaders and councillors as “designed” by the federal government “to be the new Indian agents to keep us down, to keep us oppressed.

“Chief and councils aren’t leadership,” said Day Neveau. “They aren’t our natural ways. We have our own ways of governing ourselves. No more Indian Act chiefs dictating for us. Our people have been pushed around for too long. We want people to start respecting our homelands, have dignity for Mother Earth, rather than the future generations paying for our consequences.”

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Day Neveau wants “to see my land back” before she’ll leave the bridge.

“We’re not afraid of the cops,” she said. “We’re not afraid to get arrested. We got to disrupt the corporate Canada more than anything right now. We need to apply this pressure and to say that business as usual in Canada isn’t happening anymore.”

Sault Ste. Marie Police Service has officers at the bridge entrance and is “continuing to monitor the situation,” spokesperson Lincoln Louttit told reporters at the scene.

“This is a peaceful gathering and we’re going to continue to monitor the situation as it unfolds,” he said.

Provincial liaison officers with city police, Ontario Provincial Police and Royal Canadian Mounted Police, who work with Indigenous communities, are at the bridge site keeping in contact with demonstrators.

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“We’re communicating with our partners and making sure that everything is peaceful and safe,” said Louttit.

He was not aware of any clashes between protestors and members of the public since the demonstration started.

Sault Ste. Marie Bridge Authority is responsible for the crossing’s maintenance. Unless there’s a concern about the infrastructure, the authority won’t be involved in the demonstration, general manager Peter Petainen told The Sault Star.

Bridge traffic for the first 12 hours of Tuesday was comparable with 2019. Petainen couldn’t break down how many of those crossings were northbound and southbound.

The protest is happening on land owned by Federal Bridge Corp., the Canadian owner of the International Bridge.

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The Crown corporation’s “prime concern” is ensuring “everybody is safe and secure,” said director of communications Todd Kealey. “We run a bridge and the only thing we look to arrest is rust and decay. We respect peoples’ right to express themselves and we just hope that they respect the property and don’t cause any damage. Safety is really all we’re concerned about.”

Day Neveau would only identify as an Anishinawbe and declined to identify her First Nation membership. She was recently in British Columbia for about three weeks “and went to the frontlines” when RCMP arrested protesters opposing the Coastal GasLink pipeline earlier this month.

Day Neveau took part in an Indigenous youth suicide protest at MP Terry Sheehan’s office shortly after he was elected. She was also at Parliament Hill in Ottawa in 2017 when Canadians were celebrating the country’s sesquicentennial “without knowing the terror that our ancestors had to face” for Canada to be established.

btkelly@postmedia.comOn Twitter: @Saultreporter

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