Wow! Ahead of Royal Bank of Canada’s shareholder meeting this Wednesday, April 5 in Saskatoon, people across so-called Canada made a huge splash on Saturday for April 1 Fossil Fools’ Day!

This came days after federal police, the RCMP, raided a Gidimt’en village site and arrested Indigenous land defenders – mostly womxn – on bogus charges. As you may know, land defenders have been trying to stop the build out of the Coastal Gaslink fracked gas pipeline across Wet’suwet’en territory for years, delaying the project and causing huge cost overruns.

Thousands of people at over 40 actions rallied in solidarity at RBC branches including in Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Toronto, Montréal, Moncton, Halifax, and more.

There were protests, lock downs and sit ins, pickets and creative rallies! Shout out to all the big organizing that everyone did. Too many groups to name here – we are so grateful for your leadership!

There were over 150 media stories including national TV and newspaper coverage and significant local media, including

This is part of a drumbeat of escalation and a brighter spotlight focused on Canada’s largest financier of fossil fuels and one of the biggest in the world – RBC.

Here’s an in-depth media story and an opinion piece on how shareholder meetings are a focus this year for climate and Indigenous rights advocates alike: