By Zanna Linskaia
Following day, after pro-Palestinian rally in Coquitlam I went to RCMP station and
City Hall with questions I wanted to ask the local authorities - who gave permission
to run their rally in Coquitlam mall, who financially supports them and what kind of
penalty would they have for hatred slogans and calls to killing Jews with intifada
on Israel. The response was zero. No RCMP, neither City Hall are willing to
investigate Hamas supporters’ activities. Moreover, police officer did not want to
tell me his name or give me a form for complaint. “This is a freedom of speech,
they did not kill anybody”, - he argued sarcastically. In the office of Coquitlam
mayor - Richard Stewart, his secretary with a wide smile on her face declined my
request for meeting with him. “He is very busy, besides, he cannot do anything to
avoid these protests - we are free country”. Really? Only for Hamas supporters to
“Free Palestine from the river to the sea”?
Through the opened door of the mayor’s office I saw an aged Mr. Stewart eating
nuts and drinking coffee. For sure, he heard a dialog between me and his
secretary, pretending to be very busy. Are you going to vote for him again?
My next step was to the mall administrative office, where his manager admitted
that pro-Palestinian rally was not authorized by administration. For instance, they
followed all recommendations by police for customers’ security. She watched all
cameras’ footage and did not find any harms made by protestors. What can I say
about this hypocrisy and bigotry?
One of our Burquest founders and members Bill Gruenthal sent me his comments:
“It is going to get worse; the government is importing these people with our tax
dollars, feeding them with our tax dollars - but, as expected, they will vote for the
government that brought them in, in the next election.
Things don’t look too good for our future here - We need to withdraw all our financial
support from public places such as universities, hospitals, libraries, museum ( not
that those people would ever go to one ), etc. We have enough doctors to look after
ourselves. We need to act - but we don’t.”
However, we have opportunity to help ourselves by writing to currently serving
Coquitlam MLA’s:
Fin Donnelly - fin.donnelly.MLA@leg.bc.ca phone-604-942-5020
Hon.Selina Robinson - selina.robinson.MLA@leg.bc.ca phone: 604-933-2001
Rick Glumac - rick.glumac.MLA@leg.bc.ca phone 604-936-8709
And we can also participate in civic meetings and run for the available seats of government especially in the next provincial election. Get involved in you local goverments. Understand how they operate.
And preparing for an independent future. We need to all learn not to lean on the government. We need to start to grow our own food again. Find new ways to power our homes with geothermal power + other sources of energy. BChydro can turn off your lights/heat/ air conditioner any time they want. The SMART METERS allow the government to do this.
Use cash as much as possible. It leaves no trail. The government does not track cash purchases. Cash stays inside the local community.
Much of…