The exemplary tranquility of Ottawa, the capital of Canada, has been disrupted recently as it is occupied by self-proclaimed “freedom truck drivers”, by cross-border truck drivers transporting goods to and from the United States, who reject the vaccine dictatorship. The protests began two weeks ago, but are now taking a worrying turn as they hamper the smooth running of the economy: The Ambassador Bridge, which connects Canada to Detroit and carries $300 million worth of goods a day, remains blocked by , which is causing major problems for both the U.S. and Detroit auto companies in Canada, and if the bridge continues to be occupied, auto companies may lay off workers.
Liberal Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau, who was taken to a safe place by security forces when it became clear that protesters were relentless, spoke of a threat to the Canadian economy and democracy. Recent opinion polls suggest that a majority of Canadians support Justin Trudeau’s government’s mandatory vaccination measure, which went into effect on Jan. 15, and call for even stricter restrictions on those who do not see it, at 49 percent. %, responsible for the continuation of the pandemic.
Those who appear divided over the protests are the voters of the opposition right-wing Conservative Party, whose leader, Erin O Toul, was ousted on February 3 for not expressing enough support for the protesters.
Occupying Ottawa is led by the emerging right-wing Canadian Maverick Party, which favors the secession of the western provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba from Canada. The leader of Tamara Leach, a former gymnast, organized a campaign through the online platform GoFundMe, which raised $ 7.8 million for the purpose of lifting the measures for Covid-19. However, the platform accepted only $ 1 million of that amount and returned the rest to donors, citing police assurances that the money would be used for illegal and violent actions during the protests. The “Convoys of Freedom” organizers include the Teamster of Canada (brother of the Historic Teamster of the USA), as well as the Canada Unity, which calls for the lifting of restrictive measures and the right of the unvaccinated to return to work. With them comes the far-right People’s Party of Canada, a non-parliamentary party whose leader, Maxime Bernier, opposes vaccinations, immigrants and your culture, respectively.
There has always been concern about the spread of the phenomenon in the US, where the anti-vaccination movement is much larger than its Canadian counterpart. The rate of vaccinated citizens in Canada is 80% while in the US only 65% (data from the World Health Organization). The role of the social networks of facebook and the telegram platform in the organization of the American vaccines proves to be decisive. Two weeks ago, 150,000 Facebook users voiced support for Canadian immunizers, while last week 50,000 users joined another group to bolster the US immunization movement. Meta, Facebook’s parent company, said it had removed several “Freedom Convoys” groups from the platform for violating the company’s rules on the dissemination of conspiracy theories, such as the QAnon conspiracy movement, which led to the invasion of the US Capitol January 6, 2021.
