Canada has faced more serious threats than Indigenous protests and Western alienation: Christian

Jean Chrétien mocks the idea that Indigenous protests and Western alienation are a threat to the national unity of Canada.

The former Liberal Prime Minister said Tuesday that Canada had suffered from the worst threats in the past and that it had always managed to survive.

He remembers the 1960s and 1970s when radical separatists from the Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ) launched bombs, kidnapped the British trade commissioner and killed a Quebec minister.

"It's been a few years and we are still together, more united than ever," Chrétien told reporters after recalling his 40-year career in federal politics at a conference in Ottawa dedicated to his decade as a Prime Minister.

Some politicians and experts have recently argued that Canada is broken, unable to reconcile the land rights of Indigenous peoples and the need to fight climate change with the economic benefits of the exploitation of natural resources.

These competing demands have clashed in recent weeks as blockades have arisen across the country in support of Hereditary Wet’suwet’s chiefs as they fight a pipeline in northern British Columbia.

READ MORE: Trudeau's approval rating has dropped as blockages of solidarity with Wet & # 39; suwet & # 39; persist

The barricades, one of which remains south of Montreal, paralyzed rail traffic and damaged the economy.

But Chrétien, who was Minister of Indian Affairs for more than six years under Pierre Elliott Trudeau, said that there had been periodic protests by Indigenous peoples for decades and that they had all been resolved One way or the other.

"Do you think this problem will break the nation?" Asked Christian then answered. "No. Because Canada is stronger than that. We are still facing a problem and we are solving it … We have no inferiority complex."

He urged a speaker to "relax" and put the recent protests in perspective.

"You are young, you will see a lot of problems until you are my age," said the 86-year-old.

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During his tenure as Minister of Indian Affairs, Chrétien and elder Trudeau faced a major backlash for a 1969 policy proposal, known as the White Paper, which called for the abolition of the Indian Act and the Elimination of Indian Status, among other measures. The Liberal government of the day withdrew the proposal the following year.

Pipeline dams have added to frustration in Alberta, where many blame the Trudeau government's environmental policies for the province’s inability to get its crude oil to coastal waters for export abroad.

This was compounded by Teck Resources' recent decision to cut plans for a new oil sands mine in Alberta, citing the unresolved conflict between climate change policy and resource development.

READ MORE: In a letter to Trudeau, Kenney says the rejection of the Teck Frontier project could be a "boiling point" for Western alienation

Discussions on the separation of Alberta from Canada have intensified since Justin Trudeau's Liberals were re-elected last fall, but Chrétien said such a speech had no impact. meaning.

READ MORE: Alberta MPs Release Buffalo Declaration To Call On Ottawa To Combat Western Alienation

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Is the Alberta separatist movement gaining momentum?

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While Chrétien exuded confidence in Canada's ability to weather the storms, he was not as optimistic about the rest of the world.

During the conference, he deplored the fact that democracy is "shrinking" in countries around the world, including Hungary, Poland, Turkey and the United States. And he lamented the proliferation of "fake news" and the impression that "the truth no longer matters".

Chrétien said it was "disturbing" that the media in the United States had documented many cases in which President Donald Trump lied and yet "there is no ripple in the river".