Enviros Rally Against Clayoquot Industrialization

Enviros Rally Against Clayoquot Industrialization   Published Date: 2008/8/2 16:50:00 Article ID : 4731 Audience : Default --> Version 1.00.02

Published Date: 2008/8/2 16:50:00 Reads : 67 -->

Adriane Carr, deputy leader Green Party of Canada, spoke out against industrialization in Clayoquot Sound during a Saturday afternoon rally in Tofino. Click here to watch the video. (Keven Drews Photo)

By Keven Drews

TOFINO — Some of BC’s biggest environmental stars asked more than 150 supporters to oppose logging, mining and hydroelectric power plans for Clayoquot Sound during a Saturday afternoon rally.
Adriane Carr, deputy leader Green Party of Canada, and Vicky Husband, senior adviser at Watershed Watch Salmon Society, reiterated their support for aboriginal rights and title, but said current industrial plans were wrong for Clayoquot Sounds and its people.
Only one person, John Frank, deputy chief councillor of the Ahousaht First Nation, openly challenged the environmentalists, and he demanded aboriginals should have the right to make a living.
“Is this what we want in our pristine valleys of Clayoquot Sound,” asked Husband. “Is this what we want in Clayoquot Sound at all? I would say no. I would absolutely say no. So I think we have to oppose all of these projects.”
The rally took place in a small waterfront park, located in downtown Tofino, just off Main Street.
Currently, Coulson Forest Products, of Port Alberni, and First-Nations owned MaMook Natural Resources Ltd. have plans to log an untouched watershed in the Hesquiat Point Creek, north of Tofino.
Selkirk Metals Corp. and the Ahousaht First Nation are exploring Catface Mountain, located 13 kilometres northwest of Tofino, for copper.
And Synex Energy Resources Ltd., of Vancouver, plans to apply for a licence of occupation for a water project on Bulson Creek, located northeast of Tofino.
Carr said if development must take place in the Clayoquot Sound UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, it must respect nature.
Holding up a photo of a clearcut near Hesquiat Point Creek, Carr questioned current logging practices.
“This is what no one envisioned would happen within a biosphere reserve,” she said. “This is not world-class forestry standards. This is a clearcut, like the old-fashioned clearcuts that everybody knew would destroy watersheds, would lead to erosion, would lead to the siltation in our oceans, in our rivers.”
“The planet is under threat. Those precious places like Clayoquot Sound are getting fewer and fewer.”
Husband said runoff from acid rock – collected in large tailing ponds should the Catface mine go ahead – could leach into and poison rivers.
And she called Synex Energy Resources Ltd.’s hydroelectric plans “scary,” and said they were part of a larger plan to privatize rivers.
“Is this our future for Clayoquot Sound,” she asked. “I don’t think so. We need to find better ways of looking for economic development that doesn’t threaten the natural beauty of Clayoquot Sound, the ecosystems of Clayoquot Sound, the salmon of clayoquot sound.”
Meantime, Frank questioned whether environmentalists had the right to tell First Nations what to do. He said until a treaty is settled, Ahousaht’s traditional territory still belongs to the hereditary chiefs.
“I never go to Europe. I never go to the Queen and tell her how to be in her territory. What gives the right of any other society to come here and say that to me and my chiefs?”
He said environmentalists should look at what they’re doing in their own backyards before they look at others.
“I am disappointed, in the last 125 years, you have come to my land and reaped the benefits of the mountains, reaped the benefits of the ocean, and left me with nothing. What am I supposed to feel like? What am I supposed to think about you?”
He also said every time Ahousaht residents try to put bread and butter on their tables, they hit brick walls.
“Give us a chance to do what we need to do on our own.”