White Nationalist group has a permit to rally on city property and councillors are furious

Counter-protesters plan to demonstrate in Peterborough, Ontario on Saturday to oppose a white nationalist rally that received a permit to take place on city property to the chagrin of many locals and city councillors. It’s one of several similar far-right gatherings set to happen this weekend in cities across Canada.

The Peterborough event’s organizer, Kevin Goudreau of the Canadian Nationalist Front, says he expects between 20 and 50 people to attend his rally to promote Canadian “patriotism” and to oppose Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s “illegal immigration” policies. He says he felt more confident in his objectives after the city granted him a permit earlier this week for the demonstration across from the city hall.

“We’re doing this… to unite the right-wing in a sense, to show unity and show force that people don’t support Trudeau,” Goudreau told VICE News. “The silent majority is coming out and speaking out and willing to protest and show the world and Canada that people are fed up with the way things are.”

A number of other rallies organized by Storm Alliance — a far-right anti-immigration group founded by former Soldiers of Odin leaders — are set to also take place on Saturday, according to a couple of Facebook events, although it’s unclear how many participants are expected to show up. The ultra-conservative, anti-Islam, group Soldiers of Odin took root in Canada over the last year and gained notoriety for its street patrols that have been called scare tactics against people of colour.

Goudreau says his rally is in “solidarity” with Storm Alliance, which recently patrolled the Quebec-US border where thousands of asylum seekers have been crossing to seek refugee status in Canada.

Goudreau claims his group has “more than 50” members who he says go through a strict vetting process to weed out “agent provocateurs.” Previous news reports have found the group has only a handful of members. Its website states its mission is to “[stop] the flow of third world immigrants” and “see the return of Canada’s original predominantly White-European and Native Aboriginal ethnic makeup.”

Local city councillors, religious groups, and other community leaders in Peterborough have slammed the event as promoting hatred and white supremacy at a time when hate crimes and acts of racism have been on the rise in Canada. As of Wednesday, more than 770 people had signed a statement supporting the counter-protest. The city’s administrative officer, however, said local authorities couldn’t deny a permit for the far-right rally as freedom of speech is a Charter right.

One particularly vocal councillor and main organizer of the counter-protest, Diane Therrien, told CBC’s As It Happens on Wednesday that the city should never have granted Goudreau a permit to protest on city grounds. She has repeatedly decried Goudreau as a neo-Nazi. Even though Goudreau has a swastika tattoo emblazoned on his chest, he eschews the white supremacist and neo-Nazi labels, preferring instead to be called a “patriot,” “white nationalist” or “ultra-conservative.”

“The type of person that is organizing this rally and who he’s hoping to draw in, unfortunately are people that don’t seem to have a lot of joy or love in their lives and are driven by anger and violence,” said Therrien. She said the counter-protests, dubbed the “day of creative resistance,” will include dancing, singing, and drumming as a means to show “what a community can look like and should look like.”