Canada’s Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland, saw a threat to national security in comments by American investors who said the country had become “a joke” and “a banana republic” during the Convoy crisis. freedom.
“At that time, I had a duty to Canadians, to stand up for them,” said the Deputy Prime Minister Thursday before the Commission on the state of emergency.
Her voice strangled by emotion, she had to take a short break and drink a sip of water during her appearance before Judge Paul Rouleau. She was explaining that Canada suffers from a chronic lack of foreign investment, and that the Freedom Convoy blockades at the borders were becoming an argument for American protectionists.
The minutes of a meeting with representatives of major banks held on February 13, on the eve of the invocation of emergency measures to dislodge the blocking of truckers opposed to health measures against COVID-19, show that Unflattering comments from U.S. investors toward Canada were shared at Mme Freeland.
“I just spent some time in the States last week, and we were being called a ‘joke’ by people. An investor said to me, ‘I don’t want to invest another penny in your banana republic in Canada’,” reported an unidentified financial institution executive.
The Rouleau commission must determine whether it was justified for Ottawa to invoke emergency measures to dislodge the Freedom Convoy, a protest movement that disrupted the federal capital and various crossing points with the United States, the last winter.
Government officials had previously expressed that the move raised concerns for Canada’s reputation and in particular its image with US investors. The Minister of Finance added that this puts jobs at risk for different industries, citing Quebec’s aluminum smelters as an example.
She did not want to say whether this economic threat fit the description included in the law, the definition of which refers to section 2 c) of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) Act and which is limited to ” the use of serious violence or threats of violence”. She merely reiterated that the government had the legal authority to invoke emergency measures.
Asked whether general strikes and other economic blockages linked to protest movements around the world were also illegitimate in her eyes, Chrystia Freeland replied that the Canadian example stood out because the country is a democracy.
“There are big differences between actions of popular resistance, or even revolutions against totalitarian regimes, and demonstrations in democracy,” she said.
The Deputy Prime Minister recalled that vaccination obligations at the border were explicitly part of the Liberal election promises during the election held only a few months before, in September 2021. “It was fresh. »
She reiterated that the problem was that “the trade had stopped”, and mentioned that the Convoy demonstrators could have just as well made their point of view known by limiting themselves to occupying a park.
The prime minister’s chief of staff, Katie Telford, is also due to testify on Thursday. The public hearings conclude Friday with the highly anticipated testimony of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau himself.