Resisting the Pallister Attacks
Public services in Manitoba are under serious assault.
The majority Progressive Conservative government, elected in April 2016 following many years of milquetoast social democratic rule from the NDP, predictably promised to maintain frontline jobs and improve services for Manitobans. Hints were made of impending spars with public sector unions and plans to cut tax rates.
But little prepared Manitobans for what was to come in the government’s second budget that was released in early April.
It wasn’t an overt slash-and-burn budget out of the Ralph Klein or Mike Harris playbook. Many leftists in the province initially sighed relief, concluding it wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been.
Then the province started to see the fallout.
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Waiting for the NDP
But Manitoba’s Left largely has no idea how to respond. Almost two decades of NDP reign has turned the aspirations of many local activists to mush, resulting in incantations that Manitobans simply must mobilize — in the form of very occasional and very ineffectual rallies, petitions and postering — for the next provincial election, in order to get the NDP elected again in 2020.
That’s it. That’s the gameplan: the sole form of “resistance” to vicious austerity measures.
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Indigenous Nations Rising
Luckily, we’ve already been provided examples of alternatives.
Mostly by Indigenous peoples in Canada, actually. We obviously can’t draw immediate parallels, with struggles by First Nations, Métis, Inuit and non-status Indians representing a unique sociopolitical struggle grounded in distinct cultural, spiritual and legal relationships with lands and waters.
But the tactics born out of that are certainly worth exploring.
It wouldn’t seem it from all the glowing profiles about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but the territory known as Canada is ablaze with resistance and resurgence from Indigenous peoples and communities.