OTTAWA, Ontario—The center of Canada’s capital city was flooded on Feb. 12 by thousands of protesters demanding an end to the country’s COVID-19 mandates and restrictions.
Many more joined the ongoing trucker-led protest in Ottawa with the arrival of the weekend. Its numbers grew from the night of Feb. 11 into the next morning, as supporters seemingly poured into the city.
Greater masses of people were particularly noticeable on Parliament Hill and then later on the streets, where they spilled out from the immediate vicinity of the truck blockade.
At about 10 a.m., several thousand protesters were marshaled into groups to form the word “freedom.” They then waved their red and white maple leaf flags and sang the national anthem, “O Canada,” with passion and rousing volume. On finishing, they burst into loud cheering and the maple leaves waved again.
The effort helped rouse the spirits of the protesters on what was a very cold winter’s day, as the morning temperature reached as low as negative 10 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit), and snow was being whipped into the air by a gusty wind.
Denis Cadieux, a carpenter from Orléans, told The Epoch Times that he liked almost everything about the protests and the way that people had behaved. If there were one thing he would change, it would be to cut out the negative signs and messages.
“They make us sound violent,” he said.
Cadieux said the main phrase he didn’t like was the one that said, “[Expletive] Trudeau.”
“Trudeau is a human being like anybody,” he said. “He makes mistakes and, unfortunately, he is making such a big mistake he needs to step down. And that we understand, but we cannot hate him for that. Hate is a big word.”
“I think we all need to be respectful of everybody. I respect Trudeau for what he did. But for us, it doesn’t work and he needs to step down. But take down the signs. As supporters, we need to take [expletive]out of the equation.”
Source: The Epochtimes