“They throw us out like used tissue paper. We cannot stay silent. Only one thing can save us – UNITY.”
That was Bikram Kullewala of the PGWP Committee, speaking in Toronto Sunday, and this weekend he was one of thousands saying it.
From coast to coast, in eleven cities, migrants and supporters took to the streets, the markets, and the community halls – marching, talking to neighbours, screening films, smashing piñatas, standing together against racism and division.
Click to share on Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | X
In Toronto, where Bikram spoke, 1,200 voices chanting and marching fired up the streets of the west end
Among them marched a delegation of farmworkers and supporters from Niagara, in bright safety vests – worn to remember the migrant farmworkers killed and seriously injured travelling at night in unsafe conditions, including Sinhue Garcia.
In Vancouver, migrants and supporters rallied at Memorial South Park and gleefully smashed piñatas shaped like Bill C-12 and the injustices of the immigration system.
“We are demanding that those people who came into this country with the promise of a clear pathway to permanent residence get that promise fulfilled,” said Lucero Gonzalez. “We are humans, and we deserve — at the bare minimum — basic labour rights, basic human rights.”
In Ottawa, over a hundred people gathered at the Human Rights Monument to chant and listen to powerful speeches.
“People who have built their lives here, building communities, paying taxes, contributing to services they can’t access — they are in crisis,” said Karen Cocq of the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change.
In Owen Sound, more than a dozen people marched behind a handmade banner reading “Status 4 All” and “Stop Deportations,” carrying signs including one that said “Blame Billionaires – Not Migrants.”
This weekend wasn’t only rallies and marches.
In Sudbury, people filled the Moose Lodge for speeches, cultural performances and conversation, the walls lined with written accounts of migrants’ struggles and successes. One told of paying thousands of dollars and working an Ontario farm while waiting for a work permit that never came: “Now I have to return to my country.”
In Kelowna, a hall filled to the brim – performers in colourful dresses swept across the floor, drums sounded, and people clapped along, coming together to build relationships and stand with one another.
In Montréal, community members gathered for a panel on the city’s history of fighting deportations, alongside self-defence training and film – connecting yesterday’s resistance to today’s.
We also carried our demands into everyday conversation. In Fredericton, migrants and supporters set up at the Boyce Farmers Market on Saturday, gathering petition signatures and talking with neighbours. In Guelph, activists brought leaflets and homemade signs into the Sunday shopping crowd. In Charlottetown, people came together at the public library for documentary screenings and discussion – watching, and talking, and learning together.
In every one of those eleven cities – in the chants and the piñatas, the packed halls and the food market conversations – we were saying the same four things:
- Renew Work Permits. Automatically extend expired and expiring work and study permits, and restore people’s status so they can stay, work and study here.
- Stop Deportations. Keep families together. End detention and removals, and protect refugees.
- End Exploitation. Free workers from permits that tie them to a single employer. Guarantee equal rights at work, safe housing, healthcare and services, and hold abusive employers accountable.
- Status for All. Give permanent resident status to all migrants already here, and to future migrants when they arrive.
Parliament is back this week. So are we.
The unity we built across eleven cities this weekend doesn’t end when the actions do. We will keep building it, city by city, until every migrant has equal rights and permanent resident status. That takes all of us.