Letter: Time for BC to wake up
By Letters to the editor
To The Editor:
The BC mining industry just hit a brick wall, and it’s time for BC to wake up and engage.
Premier David Eby does not have the moral or Constitutional right to arbitrarily award 6% of the people of our province unfettered use and control of our Crown lands and resources.
The truth about UNDRIP is very simple. It’s the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The United Nations adopted those protocols because a lot of native people around the world were and still are being neglected and abused.
Those conditions do not exist in Canada today.
BC Premier David Eby, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have arbitrarily decided to ignore those protocols, and insist consult means consent, and that indigenous people now have VETO powers over the occupancy and use of Crown lands and development of our natural resources.
Using that same culturally appropriate dictionary also means the remaining 94% of the Canadian people have those same rights to be consulted, including the right to VETO any and all government policies and projects.
Trudeau and Eby do not have the right to redefine our country without public input and consultation.
It’s also time to start telling the public and the media the truth about reconciliation.
Without that truth there can, and never will be reconciliation.
Andy Thomsen, Kelowna BC
