Thousands of people protested against Stephen Harper’s prorogation of Parliament in more than 60 communities yesterday.
Various news reports noted that 7000 people gathered in Toronto, 3500 in Ottawa, 200 in Regina, 200 in Saskatoon, 500 in Halifax, 250 in Edmonton, 600 in Vancouver, 500 in London, 300 in Winnipeg, and 75 in North Bay.
The media also reported on protests in Calgary (outside Harper’s constituency office), Owen Sound, Windsor, Sudbury, as well as Dallas, San Francisco, England, and Costa Rica.
The Guardian reports that more than 100 people protested in Charlottetown. The newspaper quotes Council vice-chair Leo Broderick saying, “Our theme that we chose is democracy and not dictatorship for this rally… I think what we have right now is a prime minister who is a rogue prime minister and if you look at what is happening, we in the Council of Canadians are joining thousands and thousands of people across Canada in putting up signs saying ‘Harper is wanted for violating democracy in this country and increasingly around the world.'”
We have also heard from Council activists about protests in Wolfville (100 people in a community of 6000), Hamilton (400 people), and Durham Region (‘prorogue incineration not Parliament’).
Many more protests took place yesterday – including in Duncan, Grand Prairie, Guelph, Inverness, Kamloops, Kelowna, Lethbridge, Peterborough, and Prince Albert. Let us know about the protest in your community and we will update this report.
We will also post the video of Maude Barlow’s speech on Parliament Hill to our website on Monday [click here to view]. CTV broadcast their interview with Maude, where she made the links to climate change, on their main channel and we’ll see if we can share that too.
The Globe and Mail reports that, “Meanwhile, Mr. Harper has brushed off the anti-prorogation protests. He offered his response at the Ottawa headquarters of the Department of Foreign Affairs on Saturday. Mr. Harper said the government is urgently trying to craft an agenda for the March 3 resumption of Parliament while dealing with the ‘life and death issues’ of the Haiti earthquake.”
The Globe and Mail adds, “Liberal and New Democrat MPs will be on Parliament Hill Monday for a week of hearings, discussions and news conferences on unemployment, aiding Haiti, the pension crisis and Afghanistan, among other issues.”
More than 210,000 people have joined the Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament Facebook page over the past three weeks.
