Why Merlyn’s Anti-Racism rally is rescheduled for this coming Sunday

Posted on March 25, 2010 | 1 Comment
(UPDATED March 26/10)
1. As of today CUPE 3903 is calling for their supporters to again try to shut down Merlyn Kinrade’s CANACE Anti-Racism Rally this coming Sunday in Caledonia at 2pm.
2. Canada Free Press journalist Bill McIntyre has just published an absolutely scathing critique of the media’s failure to hound the Ontario government over Caledonia in light of the intimidation by Tom Keefer and CUPE 3903:
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Merlyn Kinrade and CANACE are re-staging their Anti-Racism Rally this Sunday, 2pm at the Caledonia Lions Hall after they cancelled it on the spot last Sunday after members of CUPE 3903 and native protesters who support the use of criminal behaviour by the Haudenosaunee Men’s Fire showed up to disrupt the event. 

Why last Sunday’s protest was cancelled

Since the OPP refused requests from Merlyn to send officers to separate the two sides, CANACE decided, shortly after 2pm to immediately re-schedule the protest for this coming Sunday, and left the area at 2:23pm. This is why:

The situation on Sunday was very similar to what happened during a Dec 01/07 smokeshack protest where non-natives were attacked and sent to hospital because the OPP changed their SOP and failed to provide sufficient resources ( including – curiously enough, for the first time in Caledonia’s history, officers capturing evidence on videotape). OPP officer Jeff Bird testified he was “alarmed” at the lack of resources for the protest and that it was not following SOPs.

Insufficient officers present allowed those supporters of the smokeshack to cross the police ‘line’ to provoke confrontations and conduct numerous assaults on residents and CANACE founders, including yours truly. The police refused to arrest any of them, but did manage to arrest a resident quietly drinking coffee.

While the victims of the native violence were still in the hospital Fantino and the OPP issued a news release blaming the non-native victims for the violence, and later wrote a letter of reference for the native man who led the swarming attack on Gary McHale which – incredibly – blamed McHale for the violence against him.

And, as we now know from OPP emails, Fantino ordered his officers to target McHale for charges even though the force had now evidence to support one, and two of his most senior officers are now facing Obstructing Justice charges because they followed those instructions.

McHale (and some reporters) believe that the OPP deliberately allowed the situation on Sunday to remain under-policed in order to allow a confrontation/violence to break out for which they could again blame him, and then tell the town, See – Gary’s dangerous. After what transpired on Dec 01/07, I can hardly blame him for thinking that since that’s exactly what I told the Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services in a complaint dated May 30/08:

Gary McHale has sent a detailed letter to the Minister of Community Safety informing him about the activities of the leader of last Sunday’s CUPE protest, Tom Keefer, who has a long history of supporting organized crime groups in Caledonia & Brantford. McHale warned the minister that if violence does break out this Sunday because of a failure to protect our right to speak, there will be legal repercussions for him and the OPP.

Tom Keefer/CUPE 3903 role in Caledonia’s misery

I have prepared a special fact-sheet for Tom Keefer which is under construction on a new VoC feature page called, CALEDONIA PLAYERS:

VoC Comment

At last Sunday’s protest I arrived with a sign saying, “HEALING BEGINS WITH APOLOGIES FROM OPP, MCGUINTY, 6 NATIONS.” Just two days later, on March 23/10, MPP Toby Barrett sent out an email announcing that the PC’s Aboriginal Affairs critic Ted Arnott had called for the McGuinty government to “apologize to the people of Caledonia for the ineffective policy of this government.”

I wonder if the PC’s have been reading the CANACE plan for healing and reconciliation Merlyn Kinrade and I presented to Brantford Council in September 2008:

References

Note – I will be pleased to supply bonafide journalists with PDFcopies of CUPE docs should URL’s be no longer active or contents of docs appear to be altered.

DISCLOSURE

In order to build on his extensive experience as an activist and founding member of CANACE in opposing and documenting racial policing on behalf of victims in Caledonia since October 2006, Mark Vandermaas left CANACE in February 2010 to independently focus on education and policy research regarding the adverse impact of present aboriginal policies with the goal of ensuring that the lessons learned from the victimization of innocents – both aboriginal and non-aboriginal – during land claim disputes are fully represented in policy discussions seeking long-term solutions to healing and reconciliation. Mark maintains a close working relationship with CANACE, and continues to participate in protests on behalf of the victims of racial policing. He endorses CANACE principles respecting the rule of law and the protection of human rights

This entry was posted in Anarchists & Unions in Caledonia, Caledonia - March 21/10, CANACE, CANACE News, CUPE, How low can they go?, Native Protests - Caledonia, Planet Earth calling, Racial Justice, Racial Policing, Racial Profiling, Reaching out to native people, Tom Keefer. Bookmark the permalink.

One response to “Why Merlyn’s Anti-Racism rally is rescheduled for this coming Sunday”

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