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Woman joins natives in fight against Frontenac Ventures
SHARBOT LAKE – Donna Dillman says that 17 consecutive days of living outside and going without food have left her cold and at times a little tired, but far from defeated.
The 53-year-old mother of four is staging a hunger strike to protest a plan by Frontenac Ventures Corporation to mine for uranium along a 5,000-hectare property in the Sharbot Lake area.
“The biggest issue hasn’t been hunger pain, it’s been the cold,” Ms. Dillman says, between sips of green herbal tea she keeps in a jar beside her feet. “As long as I sip, I’m OK.”
She credits her tea—along with a hearty concoction she has been drinking made of maple syrup, lemon juice and cayenne pepper—with providing the energy to make it through each day.
Ms. Dillman has been living in a tent-trailer parked in a former “tent city” on the side of Highway 509, 12 kilometres north of Highway 7, since Oct. 8.
It’s the site of a June blockade by members of the Ardoch Algonquin and Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nations communities—both of whom oppose the uranium mining plan.
Last weekend, both communities moved their protest from the interior of the property that Frontenac Ventures intends to explore to the side of the road where Ms. Dillman is now. They vacated the property after tentatively agreeing to a deal whereby the provincial government pledged to consult them on the future of the mine and that an independent observer will watch over the work undertaken by Frontenac Ventures.
Ms. Dillman is not a member of either of the aboriginal communities, but she supports their cause: It is her goal to get the provincial government to stop the potential mine.
So far, she has little to show for her efforts—other than a sunburned face—to get a response from the provincial government, but Ms. Dillman vows to continue fighting for her cause.
“My part here is to keep the government’s feet to the fire,” she says. “We can’t let up.”
She keeps her supporters apprised of any developments through a daily blog—a “runner” picks up her writings on a portable hard drive and puts it on the Internet each day on her behalf—and they visit the site to keep her company during the days and nights.
And while a nurse comes by to check her pulse and blood pressure every other day, Ms. Dillman says she realizes that there are risks in undertaking a hunger strike.
“When it hits the wall, we’ll rethink and make a new decision,” she said, adding that she doubts her decision will be to quit.
© The Ottawa Citizen 2007