‘Please do not leave my future to waste,’ teen urges politicians at Halifax climate rally

 The urgent call for immediate and consistent climate action once again reverberated through Halifax’s downtown streets on Friday afternoon.

“I am so tired,” Iman Mannathukkaren, a 17-year-old Grade 12 student at Halifax West High School, told the Grand Parade gathering, flanked on either side by the imposing City Hall building and dozens of homeless tents.

“I am tired of reading the news, only to see another climate record broken, I am tired of big corporations prioritizing profit over the planet, I am tired of seeing government inaction and I am tired of worrying about what the future has to hold,” Mannathukkaren said. 

Some 600 climate protesters rallied, carrying signs and chanting catchy phrases like “No more coal, no more oil, keep your carbon in the soil,” as they marched from City Hall down to Hollis Street, in front of Province House and along to the Nova Scotia Power building on Lower Water Street before returning to Grand Parade.

“In the last year, we have seen severe hurricanes, wildfires and flooding,” Mannathukkaren said. “This summer, especially, felt like the summer of climate calamities. World over, new records are set with headlines often looking like ‘Unusually high temperatures’ and ‘Hottest day ever,’ it has become painfully evident that we are entering the throes of climate change and it is no longer something impending in the near future. 

“The only question left is what now.”

Mannathukkaren said that question can only be answered by people in power.

“It’s those people to whom I urge, I beg, please do not leave my future to waste,” she said to a huge round of applause. “Please do the right thing so that me, my peers and generations to come can live not only as you lived but in a better world than you did.

“All I am asking is for you to do your jobs.”

Mannathukkaren urged fellow young people and the general public not to “even for a second think that you are powerless,” an easy trap to fall into.

“The power of the people is the sole reason the climate movement has risen to where it is now and it is the reason the movement will continue to grow until our demands are met.”

The rally organized by School Strike 4 Climate Halifax demanded urgent, sustained, and justice-centred climate action from local leaders and to remind those in charge that the youth are watching.

It was the fifth global climate strike since the youth climate justice movement gained momentum in 2019.

The march drew young and old alike, from small children with their parents, to high school and university students, young adults and aging grandparents.

The 2019 climate rally in Halifax drew more than 10,000 marchers onto the downtown streets but the COVID pandemic seems to have thwarted some of the movement’s momentum.

Last year’s rally in Halifax was cancelled because of hurricane Fiona.

Sadie Quinn, another of the rally’s organizers, told the marchers that the day was about climate justice.

“This crisis disproportionately affects (low income), rural and other marginalized communities,” said Quinn, a 21-year-old, fourth-year student at the University of King’s College in Halifax. 

“Everyone deserves a liveable future,” she said.