First Nation’s tiny house symbolizes resistance to pipeline

Secwepemc Nation ups fight against Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline

Water is Life. This simple and indisputable refrain echoed by Water Protectors at Standing Rock helped transform a local Indigenous resistance movement into a global flashpoint for Indigenous rights and environmental protection.

Now, the spirit of Standing Rock is moving northward.

This week, members of our Secwepemc Nation (called Shuswap in English) are building a symbol of our resistance to the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline.

This destructive pipeline aims to cross 518 kilometres of unceded Secwepemc territory, a territory that stretches from the Columbia River valley along the Rocky Mountains and Jasper National Park, west to the Fraser River, on its route from the Alberta tarsands to the Salish Sea. But we will not let that happen.

We the Secwepemc, as the sovereign decision-makers of our territory, vow to stand against this pipeline because we know the dangers it brings. So this week we will place the first of a series of hand-built tiny house directly in the pipeline’s path.

The house may be tiny, but it has a giant meaning.

It symbolizes the home that this land is to our Secwepemc families — what we are fighting to protect and what Kinder Morgan, enabled by the Trudeau government, would destroy with the Trans Mountain Expansion.

An inevitable spill puts not just land but more than 1,000 waterways under threat, jeopardizing drinking water and salmon-spawning grounds. I’ve seen first hand, from the Mount Polley disaster, that settler governments are not prepared when disaster strikes. This is too much to risk on a pipeline that will enrich so few at the expense of so many.

Like our brothers and sisters at Standing Rock, we are fighting for the water. The design for our tiny homes even came from our allies there. But in addition to Water is Life, we would add: Land is Home.

Trudeau approved this pipeline despite the clear lack of consent from more than half of the First Nations whose land it threatens. But, across Turtle Island, we are rising up. The Treaty Alliance against Tar Sands Expansion has been signed by 150 First Nations and Tribes in Canada and the U.S. that do not consent and oppose pipelines like Trans Mountain, Keystone XL, and Enbridge’s Line 3 and Energy East.

Settlers are standing with us in solidarity — including Greenpeace, who assisted with our tiny house build logistics and joined us in this act of nonviolent resistance. Meanwhile, people all around the world are taking up our fight because they know that the impacts pipelines would have on our climate threaten us all.

Yet, Kinder Morgan, brimming with bravado, still intends to begin construction this month to bring this project to fruition, so a resistance on the land won’t be enough. We need to stop these pipelines’ money at the source.

This is why the Secwepemc, alongside our allies at the Treaty Alliance and Mazaska Talks (among many others), are shining a light on the money fuelling destructive pipelines.

Last year, the #NoDAPL movement rose up to hold financial institutions accountable for Indigenous rights violations at Standing Rock. They proved that the reputational and material risks of being involved in widely opposed energy projects are very real.

Already, two major financial institutions (U.S. Bank and the Dutch ING Group) have promised not to fund DAPL or tarsands pipelines. A third, Desjardins Credit Union, has placed a moratorium on pipeline financing; its board is expected to make a final decision later this month.

As we assert our legal rights and title, pipeline financiers will face tremendous pressure, greater risk and uncertainty. We advise major pipeline funders, including TD Canada and JPMorgan Chase, to get out of the pipeline business now.

We need an economy and a way of living that put respect for the land, protection of water, and people first. This tiny house and the nine more we intend to build are reminders of this. In time, we will add solar panels to the houses to send a message that solutions are possible, right here, right now.

This tiny house that will stand in the path of a massive pipeline is proof that our collective resistance can be beautiful, model hope, possibility and community. We urge you to stand with us.

Kanahus Manuel is a leader with the Tiny House Warriors and the Secwepemc Women Warrior’s Society.

[Top photo: Women involved in the tiny house build are protesting the Kinder Morgan pipeline extension that is planned to go through the territory of the Secwepemc people.  (IAN WILLMS/GREENPEACE) ]