This is an expanded version of the interview which appeared in Rebel Youth issue #25 (2020).
Indigenous youth in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs occupied the front steps of the British Columbia Legislature building in the Provincial capital of Victoria, which is on unceded Coast Salish Lekwungan territory. The camp was set up in February and dismantled on March 5 after five of them were arrested the previous night during a sit-in in Scott Fraser’s office, the Minister of Indigenous Affairs and Reconciliation. Kolin Sutherland-Wilson was one of those Indigenous youths, and at the time of this interview on March 30, a fence has been erected outside the building’s entrance and Coastal GasLink continues to operate on Wet’suwet’en territory without the consent of the hereditary chiefs.
Rebel Youth: So, tell us a bit about your background.
Kolin Sutherland-Wilson: My name is Kolin Sutherland-Wilson, my Gitxsan name is Nii’lax Aks and the meaning of that is “On the Water”. I come from the Gitxsan nation from the village of Anspayaxw, I’m of the Fireweed clan of the Gitxsan Nation, the house of Tsi’basaa. I moved down to Victoria to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in… well, I guess a double major in Indigenous studies and Environmental studies, and that was the reason I was down here. Then everything started happening up north with the Wet’suwet’en nation who are very close allies with the Gitxsan, and from that point, you know, just the whole trajectory of my academic pursuits basically came to an abrupt halt. I had to fully commit myself to upholding the laws and alliance that we have with the Wet’suwet’en peoples.
RY: So what was your experience as a land defender occupying the front grounds of the BC Legislature?
KSW: It was very… I think it was powerful; we saw so many people come together. You know, in the beginning it was just a rowdy group of young Indigenous people representing countless nations all across the so-called state of Canada, and then it just kept growing day by day. People from all backgrounds, all walks of life, recognizing the injustice of it all, starting to see this not simply as an issue of a pipeline or an issue of, I guess… disagreements or negotiation or consultation, but rather recognizing the inherent injustices of colonialism and how this all fits into the larger scheme, starting to critically reflect on what this country is trying to accomplish, you know, whether or not Canada truly has any benevolent intentions towards Indigenous peoples and territories and whether sovereign Indigenous nations can exist within this country. You notice from the viewpoint of the Canadian state it seems like they are wholly intent on undermining all of our rights and titles, all of our authority on our territories, in the name of these industries which have no links or ties to these lands whatsoever. So being on the steps of the Legislature—seeing everyone come together, seeing the amount of people who were able to rally around this cause, you know, not just in a momentary fashion, but rather seeing a prolonged movement of people coming together, exchanging dialogue, thoughts, ideas, hopes, prayers, ceremonies, and watching it all come together—very much disrupted the center of colonial power in this province in a way that raised the consciousness of many people involved, in a way that ultimately used the truth, that used community, that used building of relationships with peoples as a way to combat the deception, the divisiveness, and the ambitions of the colonial state.
You know, it’s kind of beautiful to see how much power we hold, how much strength we have when we come together and we can come to common understandings, even if we come from different backgrounds, and to ultimately just to see the ways in which things change because for a long time, for my parent’s generation, for probably quite a few generations before that, going back to the inception of colonialism on our territories, we’ve never had that sort of support. The majority of people considered us not even to be human beings for a very long time, and the common idea back in the day was that we’d just die off and go away and everyone would have free pickings to all these territories. But just from the standpoint of the common attitude towards our people and our struggles, it gets very uplifting to see just the amount of support, the amount of people who have come together, a lot of people that reject the ongoing colonization of our lands and of the amount of people who are trying to manifest a more constructive and responsible future. So that was uplifting.
RY: You were one of the five Indigenous youths who was arrested in Scott Fraser’s office. What happened that night?
KSW: So, that night, it began with an invitation to the provincial government to come meet us, to talk, because before that point, it seemed that there was little to no interest on the part of representatives of the province to actually engage us in dialogue or discussion. Even leading up to that meeting, if you look at most of the statements by the Premier, they were very dismissive. They were just trying to label us as an ignorant radical mob, so we decided that we were going to reconstruct the ceremonial… I guess spire, the ceremonial… kind of like a tripod that was built up at Unist’ot’en, that we would stay out on the lawn and give the Province a timeframe in which to come speak with us. Because, you know, as we have been emphasising from the start, dialogue is so important and one of the main reasons that we were there to begin with is because the Province was to engage with the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs in good face dialogue.
So after we made that declaration and that invitation, we were invited on very short notice to go meet with Scott Fraser, and we tried to insist that, you know, you come out to meet us, to talk to us, we’ve set up this space, we want to invite you into ceremony. Ultimately they refused that, and we only had a short window of time to decide whether or not to meet him on the inside. So seven of us went in there and the moment we arrived, there was Scott Fraser, a few of his staff, and there was also Adam Olsen of the Green Party, who was kind of sitting just as a witness to the events.
So we began to talk with Scott Fraser, we began to voice our concerns, we re-iterated the statements of the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs. We made it clear that to us, as Indigenous youth and to countless people, that good faith negotiations, which should have happened many years ago, that these negotiations cannot take place with coercive force of RCMP or CGL, and CGL continuing to degrade Wet’suwet’en territories. So we talked for quite a long time, quite longer than the meeting had been intended for, and we raised many points about how the government, the BC government, had a responsibility and duty in this crisis to find solutions, by any means necessary, to uphold not only UNDRIP* and many of the other laws that protect the rights of the Wet’suwet’en, the right to free and prior informed consent, but also to help to achieve peace between the parties so that good negotiations can begin.
So we first mentioned the BC EAO process, the Environmental Assessment Office, and we talked about the permits and how the permits weren’t final, despite everything the Premier said about that being a done deal. We talked about how the Province had a lot of leeway to, you know, at least halt the construction while discussions were happening with the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs and within the Wet’suwet’en nation, and basically Faser said “oh, the EAO, you know, we have no control over them.” So they basically dodged all of the accountability on that front, and then we talked about the RCMP and their unlawful use of powers, which was detailed very recently in a Complaints Commissioner report that was brought to light by the BCCLA and UBCIC, the BC Civil Liberties Association and the Union of BC Indian Chiefs. So we brought up how the RCMP actions in many ways contradict the very laws of this Province and they need to be held to account, and then basically they said “oh, we have no control over the policing forces, we’re not a police state,” you know, like the usual stuff.
So every point we brought up they basically stopped us and said “we’re powerless to make any decisions in that regard,” and more and more and more we were finding out… Well, I mean at that point we just knew that they were just dodging accountability, and they were basically just trying to dismiss everything we were saying. We know for certain now, even after that meeting, there were reports outlining that… how the province authorized… I’m trying to find the right term. It was basically an expansion of police resources in tackling, you know, the Wet’suwet’en territories and the resistance there. So the meeting took place with some hard dialogue. We kept our composure, you know, we just raised many important points that Scott Fraser definitely did not offer us anything constructive, did not offer any solutions.
Ultimately he was dismissive of what we were saying and even tried to bring up points like “oh, our government has put up so much money towards native housing,” and, you know, that just didn’t sit right with us. We were there for a very concerted reason, we had very specific points and demands that we brought up and ultimately we were met with nothing. By the end of the meeting, everyone seemed, you know, at least on the Province’s side, they seemed like… how do I put it? They seemed happy about it. On our side we felt like absolutely nothing constructive had happened.
So we made the decision. We were already in that office, we were just going to sit down and refuse to leave, because otherwise, you know if we walked out of that building at that point in time, the Province would have just patted itself on the back and said like “yeah, we had dialogue, we consulted, we did our part, we can wash our hands of this whole affair.” So we decided that we’re not going out of that building unless… we left that up to the Province, how to deal with it next. I think as you saw, I probably should be mindful about how I talk about it because I am under criminal investigation. But uh… feel free to use any of this.
So yeah, at that point we just had to stand up, for our whole reason for being there. You know, we had to stand up for our values, our way of life, for myself. The law that I hold in highest regard is the Gitxsan Ayookw, and you know, Ayookw basically compels me to stand up for my people, our territories, and likewise for our very close allies, family, friends, the Wet’suwet’en. So they tried to paint us as being very disrespectful and kind of dishonouring agreements, but we never had any agreements not to leave. You know, if they had any respect for who we are as a people and if they tried to take the time to understand our reasons for being there and how we ultimately had no choice but to stay because the RCMP and CGL are still on that territory as we speak, ramping up activities, bringing in more people into those communities in a time of global pandemic now even.
With no solutions presented, with no way forward, with the government dodging all accountability and—I would even say—lying to our faces, what choice do we have but to stand our ground one way or another? We did so peacefully, and probably the most radical thing we did in that office was take a pizza through the window and have a pizza party. That means I don’t think they have very much grounds, aside from their legal system which they can… try to convict us. You know, in my mind, they don’t have the moral authority, they don’t have the legal authority and ultimately we were just standing up for who we were. We were doing so in a good way, a respectful way, we engaged in dialogue, but yeah, what choice do we have?
So there is the summary of that night.
RY: So the next question. The KSW Fanclub on Instagram has over 500 followers. I guess you have quite a few fans out there?
KSW: Oh my gosh. Um… *laughs* I… I’m still wrapping my head around that one. I really appreciated it, you know, we gotta have our humour to make it through all these things. Like, I’m typically a very low profile person. I don’t know… it’s still a little funny to me. But like, I know some of the people who set that up, and I know they are just doing it with so much love in their hearts, you know it’s good humour, it’s uplifting, sometimes a little shocking but… *laughs* I don’t know. I just appreciate all the ways that we are holding ourselves up as a community, and, you know, personally I’m a fan of the Fanclub, like I think they are hilarious and love them from the bottom of my heart. It’s still like, as a person who typically likes to not have a huge presence, it’s still getting some taking used to.
RY: Is there any advice you’d like to give to the youth out there?
KSW: Yeah! The struggle is far from over. You know, it’s as we come together we kind of share our experiences, as we engage in dialogue, as we, you know, learn from one another. We are all starting to get a clearer picture as to what we are up against. You know it’s the most important thing to keep in mind is you have nothing to fear when you have the truth behind you. So we take action when necessary and we take care of ourselves as well, and ultimately we need to keep coming together as people. We need to start growing our communities and our bonds, because if anything, this whole colonial capitalist system is designed to drive us apart so we are not accountable to each other, but rather accountable to this monolithic system that ultimately doesn’t care for us in the same way that we can, as a people, for each other. So we’ve really got to take care of one another, we really need to look out for each other.
You have to constantly stay on top of everything that’s happening, we have to be very critical of what the media is putting out there. We have to understand that, you know, especially in this day and age, there are so many ways in which we can communicate as communities, in which we can relay information and we need to start looking at the source, we need to start looking at each other, we really need to up our communications game, we need to start realising that ultimately this is an information war, and the state relies on complacency in the public. They rely on everyone basically buying into the message that, you know, “things are ok, we’re dealing with it, nothing to worry about, the government’s got a handle on this.” But then we gotta get to the point where we can mobilise together, you know, across all boundaries, and start to hold this government to account for it’s injustices.
We start by uplifting people in our communities who are trying to live more responsibly, who are trying to take care of one another, to take care of the land. When we all come together, even if Wet’suwet’en territory is so distant, we need to start realizing that what’s happening on that territory has implications for all of us.
So we need to be strategic when picking our fights and we need to go all in together, and once we have that victory in one location, it gets so much easier for us to have our victories across this entire state, It sets a precedent for everything going forward. We need to ultimately make sure that the people in power are aware that we can hold them to account, and that they need to act more responsibly, and that they have a duty to listen to the people.
So yeah, at this very moment things aren’t over at Wet’suwet’en territory, we need to really up our game, and if we can make this happen by pooling in our resources, our creativity, our knowledge, our experiences, our expertise. I think that will be just one step towards a healthier future for all humanity. So yeah, now is not the time to back down, now is the time to start thinking, to start getting creative, and to find ways to come together stronger as a community and to mobilise that power. That’s my message.
RY: One more question, and that is, what are your plans for the future?
KSW: Well for myself I’m going home, very soon up to Gitxsan territories, so I’ll be in very close proximity with my Wet’suwet’en relatives and, you know, there’s a lot of work to do back home, so I’ll be spending time with our leadership both on the Gitxsan territories and the Wet’suwet’en territories, and ultimately, I think a big part of what I hope to accomplish next is to really tell the story of everything that is happening. I guess like I mentioned before, I know this is an information war, and I know right now everything might be getting drowned out right now by COVID-19 but once we get the stories out there, it’s hard to deny the injustice taking place and uh I think that the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en nations will not be backing down. There will be a lot that’s happening in the north and if the Federal and provincial governments thought it was bad with all the railway blockades that were happening not long ago, I would just like to remind them that that all took place in the middle of winter. Now imagine what would happen if we had some nice warm summer conditions where it is actually comfortable to go camp out on the railway track. So I mean, yeah, if they don’t smarten up, no doubt in my mind that the Indigenous nations all across this country are starting to realize how much power they have when they act in concertion, so I mean there is a lot that can happen. For myself, I just try to stay flexible, ready for any situation, and stay researched, stay well read on the topic. You know, basically get ahold of as many direct information streams as I can and, ultimately, just to be constantly ready for the next thing that has to happen.
But I will be back home, I’ll be well situated for what comes next.
*The United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was implemented into Provincial law in British Columbia in November 2019 and has been adopted by 148 other countries.