Title Fight

Enbridge, the corporation hoping to build a pipeline from the Alberta Tar Sands to coastal British Columbia, has said they will pay First Nations one billion dollars to end their opposition to the plan. So far, First Nations in Alberta and British Columbia aren’t selling.

But bribery is only half the equation. The other side of that corporate coin is the threat of mobilizing anti-Indian animosity from non-indigenous Canadians hoping to cash in on pipeline construction jobs. In fact, while Enbridge is touting the big bribe, they are simultaneously marginalizing First Nations as a minority getting in the way of progress.

Despite growing opposition from north coast communities, the premiers of Alberta and British Columbia earlier this week wrote the prime minister in Ottawa, urging him to push through the Northern Gateway pipeline regardless of environmental and indigenous peoples concerns. As the filmmaker of Oil in Eden said, “I think it is shaping up to be a title fight here on a number of different levels.”