Idle No More Rally movement arrives in Nelson
By Nelson Daily Staff
Approximately 100 people braved cooler temperatures New Year’s Day to attend the Idle No More Rally in front of Nelson City Hall.
Sinixt caretaker Robert Watt joined a dozen other speakers to rally support for Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence who was in her 23-day-long hunger strike aimed at winning a meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Spence has been unsuccessfully requesting a meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper over the controversial C-45 bill.
“Our people have been here all along,” Watt told the crowd. “Pulling together is our only hope.”
Spokespeople from the Council of Canadians, the Green Party, drummers and dancers and local residents underlined Watt’s message to work together.
Protests were held in many Canadian communities as well as outside the country, particularly in the United States, since the movement began to last month to protestbill C-45.
Sunday, a visibly weakened Spence held a rare news conference from the site of her hunger strike, on an island in the Ottawa River across from Parliament Hill.
After the rally, members of the Sinixt Nation were joined by others marching down Front Street.
