NDP receives FN support

Photo: Contributed

Angelique Wood and Grand Chief Stewart Phillip.

With advanced polls having already opened and only nine days left until election day the NDP has received a large backing of support from British Columbia’s First Nations community.

Angelique Wood, NDP candidate for the mouthful of a riding, Central Okanagan-Similkameen-Nicola, met with Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UBCIC) on Friday at the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology in Merritt.

The meeting, which was open to the public, was an open discussion about Wood and the NDP’s platform, how they will address aboriginal issues, and how they plan on defeating the governing Conservative party.

This comes just two days after the UBCIC threw their weight behind the entire federal NDP platform.

“The NDP platform addresses the key issues of closing the education gap, strengthening Indigenous communities, addressing the housing crisis, prioritizing health care, and growing a sustainable economy,” said Phillip in a statement. “Obviously they listened and carefully considered the needs of Indigenous communities.”

The UBCIC is a political organization founded in 1969 that unites the many First Nations people of B.C.

While Phillip and the UBCIC said they like the NDP platform, their support also stems from their desire to remove Stephen Harper and the Conservatives from power.

“By stark contrast, the Conservatives are attempting to win public support by deliberately fomenting racial divisions within Canadian society,” Phillip said. “Conservative Party member and former MP John Cummins recently rebuked women who have gone missing from Highway 16, mostly Indigenous, for engaging in ‘risky behavior.’ His abusive remarks completely ignore the well-documented impacts of economically marginalized aboriginal communities and institutionalized racism, and are incredibly offensive.”

Phillip made headlines last November by joining the hundreds of protesters on Burnaby Mountain who opposed the Kinder Morgan Pipeline on the mountain. He was arrested, along with dozens of others, for crossing a police line which allowed Kinder Morgan crews to do survey work on the mountain.

All charges stemming from the arrests were later thrown out by the courts.

Phillip said he, along with the UBCIC is hoping for a change in government following the Oct. 19 election.

“On behalf of my 15 grandchildren, I am looking forward to exercising my right to vote on Oct. 19, to get the Harper government out, and encourage everyone to do the same,” he said. “Let’s make real change!”