June 6, 2019
Ottawa, ON (Unceded, Unsurrendered Algonquin
Territory) – In an end-of-visit statement by the United Nations
Special Rapporteur on human rights and hazardous substances and wastes,
Baskut Tuncak today called on the federal government to use its leverage
to address concerns about lack of proper consultation with
Indigenous people (especially with respect to the parameters outlined in
the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) as well as
the impending threat of methylmercury poisoning downstream of the
massive Muskrat Falls megadam in Labrador.
“I urge the Federal Government to use its leverage as the largest
investor in the project to review whether UNDRIP compatible procedures
were followed for all affected indigenous peoples, and to prevent the
release of methyl mercury,” the Rapporteur told a news conference on
Parliament Hill. The federal government backs the megaproject with $9.2 billion in loan guarantees despite well-documented concerns about dire ecological impacts and adverse affects on the lives of Indigenous people downstream. Both the Harper and Trudeau governments have supported the Muskrat Falls megadam.
During the Rapporteur’s visit to Canada, he met with Labrador
Land Protectors including Nunatsiavummiuk Amy Norman and Nunatukavut
elder James G Learning, along with Grand Riverkeeper's Roberta
Frampton Benefiel and the Ontario-Muskrat Solidarity Coalition's Matthew
Behrens.
They shared a brief outlining
their position that “Core to any study of Muskrat Falls is an
understanding that Indigenous people are disproportionately impacted by a
megaproject that has never received the free, prior and informed consent
of all Indigenous affected. The key project supporters – provincial
crown corporation Nalcor, the federal government (which backs the megadam
with $9.2 billion in federal loan guarantees), and the government of
Newfoundland and Labrador – sit at negotiating tables that
are grossly unequal and weighted in their favour,” adding “as with
many megaprojects in Canada, federal and provincial governments have
relied on their own impoverished, colonial definition of consultation at
Muskrat Falls… discounting the often dissenting concerns expressed by
elders, traditional title holders, and grassroots voices” instead of
employing the UNDRIP’s foundational guidelines of free, prior and informed
consent.
In his
statement today, the Rapporteur noted that “Concerns were
raised regarding the absence of meaningful consultation afforded to two
affected First Nations, the risk of methyl mercury releases contaminating
traditional foods and impacting health, the unaddressed risk of dam
failure, and the flooding of sites containing toxic military waste. It was
alleged that the vast majority of the affected community would either
suffer from extreme food insecurity or be forced to eat contaminated food
if the dam is constructed without proper clearance of the reservoir.”
The
risk of dam failure is a major concern for those downstream of Muskrat
Falls, since a large natural formation, The North Spur, composed of quick
clay (which liquefies under pressure), is being relied upon to hold back a
full reservoir of water. The world’s leading quick clay expert, Dr.
Stig Bernander, has studied the issue and found no independent study has shown
this to be feasible.
Today’s
statement was a significant moment in the ongoing battle over the almost
$13 billion megaproject in Labrador which its own CEO has derided as a
“boondoggle.”
“The
ongoing abuses at Muskrat Falls, and the threat of cultural genocide being
committed against Indigenous people whose traditional country food web is
set to be poisoned with a lethal neurotoxin, methylmercury, is finally on
the world stage with this recognition of serious concerns
expressed by the United Nations’ Rapporteur,” explains Matthew Behrens of
the Ontario-Muskrat Solidarity Coalition.
“Despite years of promises, no action whatsoever has been taken to
clear the reservoir of the material that will result in
the bioaccumulation of methylmercury in the fish, seals, and other country
food, as documented by a peer-reviewed, four-year study by Harvard
University. As always, the federal and provincial governments are treating
Indigenous people as a national sacrifice zone, continuing the genocide
that, ironically, Trudeau visited Labrador last year to apologize for with
respect to residential schools.”
“So
many people downstream of Muskrat Falls rely on country food for their
diet, and with Harvard University clearly showing that this food web will
be poisoned with the neurotoxin methylmercury, people are incredibly
anxious and afraid for their future and that of their children and grandchildren,”
says Nunatsiavummiuk Amy Norman.
On
Monday, Labrador Land Protectors who have journeyed thousands of
kilometres will address the national media at 9 am in the
Parliamentary Press room 135-B (where the Rapporteur delivered his remarks
today), attend a protest outside a major gathering of the
International Commission of Large Dams at 10 am at the Shaw Centre, and
then attempt to present a petition to Environment Minister Catherine
McKenna with over 15,000 signatures demanding she take action
to halt the threat of methylmercury poisoning. They will be joined
by members of communities who for years have suffered the ill
effects of similar large mega dams.
Among those who also will have traveled
significant distances are a delegation from Northern Manitoba as part of
the Wa Ni Ska Tan Alliance of Hydro-Impacted Communities. They want
to draw attention to the devastating socio-economic, cultural and
environmental impacts associated with mega-hydro and to
address delegates at the ICOLD gathering. Dr. Ramona Neckoway, Chair
of Aboriginal and Northern Studies at University College of the North and
member of Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation (Nelson House) states that
“the cumulative and extensive impacts of mega-hydro are poorly understood
and are ignored by industry, governments and regulators. In northern
Manitoba, many of us were born into damaged landscapes and fresh water has
been sacrificed for mega-hydro. I am here to stand in solidarity with
other hydro-affected communities who share similar experiences and concerns”
she explains. She and other northern Manitoba Cree recently addressed the
United Nations about these concerns.
"We're fed up with what's going
on, and how we're left out and how things are just fast-tracked in regards
to our lands,” explains Carol Kobliski, also of Nisichawayasihk Cree
Nation. “There's not proper consultation, and these dams are just coming
up all over the place."
Pimicikamak Okimawin elder Rita Monias, who was arrested in a
peaceful protest last fall on Parliament Hill, will be part of that
delegation as well.
“We have seen major displacement, a loss of
cultural knowledge, reduced access to traditional foods and medicines and
far fewer opportunities to take part in our traditional economy,
destruction of our burial grounds and cultural sites, the fear of eating
our traditional foods because of methylmercury poisoning, injury and
death due to hazardous navigation on the waters, and major changes and
reductions in the wildlife whose patterns have been disrupted by the
dams,” says Monias. “We cannot allow any more environmental devastation on
our Mother Earth. We have to protect it.”
Notably, this week’s report of the Inquiry
on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls called for a public
inquiry into another of big hydro’s ill effects: sexual assault and racism
by residents of man camps at remote Manitoba facilities like the Keeyask
dam.
Meanwhile, Meg Sheehan, traveling to
Ottawa from New Hampshire, says she has a message for the Canadian
government: “We don’t want your dirty Canadian hydropower in the
U.S. It is the equivalent of blood diamonds from Africa. There are
unacceptable impacts on local communities and Indigenous rights. In
the U.S. we are cutting off the markets for Canadian hydropower by
stopping the seven transmission corridors planned through Maine, New
Hampshire, Vermont and New York.”
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