Keep
Our Assets Canterbury (KOA) is disappointed - but not surprised
- that our request to speak at the November 29-30 Canterbury Earthquakes
Symposium has been refused.
The
Symposium's title is "Sharing The Lessons From The Canterbury
Experiences". KOA has both experiences and lessons to share, acquired in our years of successfully
campaigning to stop the Christchurch City Council from selling Christchurch's
public assets.
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| 'Disaster
Capitalism - How To Protect Community Assets' the Contribution you are not allowed to hear |
Our
proposed topic was: "Disaster Capitalism - How To Protect Community
Assets". Post-quakes Christchurch presents a textbook example of
disaster capitalism (or "shock doctrine"). KOA ran John Minto for
Mayor in 2016 and he gained around 15% of the vote. That's a lot of
Christchurch people whose voice is being excluded from this Symposium.
Some
may argue that our proposed topic is too "political". But the whole
Symposium is political, as evidenced by the fact that all speaking topics have
to be signed off by the Mayor and the Minister (Megan Woods). It's all a
question of whose politics are being presented. Or not.
From
the post-quakes outset, the people of Christchurch have been excluded from the
decision making process about our city. Not through lack of interest - the
excellent Share An Idea initiative attracted over 100,000 responses. All of
which were promptly ignored by Gerry Brownlee and the then Government, which
prioritised rebuilding the city in the interests of Big Business.
 |
| a different Government and City Council but same old story |
This
week's symposium is another example of more of the same. Different Government
and City Council, but same old story. KOA is aware of other grassroots groups
who have been told that their participation is not welcome. The symposium is
about lessons from the quakes. We say that democracy is our greatest community
asset and that it has been deliberately and wilfully trampled on. The
quakes were natural disasters - the undemocratic shock doctrine which
followed, and continues, is a strictly man made disaster.
