Pipeline protesters gather in Kelowna

A crowd of approximately 70 protesters gathered in downtown Kelowna on Monday afternoon for a ‘snap action’ rally to protest the federal Liberal government’s recent decision to purchase the Trans Mountain pipeline.

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On the doorsteps of federal MP Stephen Fuhr’s constituency office, the crowd was led by Okanagan resident Korry Zepik. Beneath sunny but windy skies, he spoke about how purchasing the pipeline was a bad idea.

“It’s time that we finally got rid of this pipeline and put it to bed,” Zepik said during his speech. “And here’s the reason why we can still get rid of it. The reason is Kinder Morgan has not ratified the agreement; they have to wait for their shareholders to ratify it. Now, honestly, if you were a shareholder, when someone wants to spend four times more money than you spent to buy it – well, actually it’s more like six times more money – buy this times at four times the market value, for sure you’re going to want to sell it. So they’re going to be laughing all the way to the bank.”

During his speech, Zepik was applauded by the crowd, which was a solid mix of young and old.

“So up until they ratify it, we still have an opportunity to tell (Prime Minister) Justin Trudeau that, no, we want you to back out of the deal. He can always pull back the offer.”

After a rally in front of Fuhr’s constituency office on St. Paul Street, the protesters marched along Bernard Avenue, downtown Kelowna’s busiest street.

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“It’ll just pollute our province and our country and you can’t clean up bitumen once it spills, it sinks to the bottom of any waterway and our kids deserve better than that,” protester Sherry Dahl told Global News. “I am very passionate about it and I want to keep our country clean.”

While the price tag to purchase the Kinder Morgan pipeline is pegged at $4.5 billion, Zepik said the cost will be far greater than that.

“Remember that Kinder Morgan was supposed to be about $7.4 billion dollars to build, well they ended up with cost overruns but they have not assessed those overruns so we don’t know where it’s going to go,” Zepik said. “But if you take $4.5 billion and you add $9 billion to it for the construction, you’re talking $13.5,  then tack on the billion and a half for ocean spill clean up and the $2 billion that has to be earmarked to go over for pipeline spills and you are talking $17.5 billion roughly and that is without anything else happening.”

Fuhr was in Ottawa at the time of the protest.

The nation-wide campaign was organized by a number of groups, which have so far gathered more than 100,000 signatures against the federal government’s buyout plans.