Torontonians watching the slow burn toward anarchy unfolding in Ottawa over the continuing #FreedomConvoy protest will have noticed a familiar name in the news this week.
Ottawa police chief Peter Sloly was once tapped to be Toronto’s first Black top cop. But he would ultimately be considered too progressive – or radical, depending on your perspective – for the likes of the police union (and outgoing chief Bill Blair). And so Mark Saunders became the choice.
To his detractors, Sloly also had a reputation for being highly political. It’s a characteristic that allowed him to rise quickly through the ranks.
After an acrimonious exit from Toronto and stint in the corporate world, Sloly landed in the nation’s capital in 2019 as the star hire charged with cleaning up a police service riven with accusations of racism after a number of highly-publicized incidents and a broken culture that he described as a “cancer.”
It’s been a hellish ride for Sloly, made more so by the pandemic and a recent decision by the force not to implement a mandatory vaccination policy for its members. That was reversed amid public backlash. Fast forward to #FreedomConvoy2022 and Sloly is once again in the spotlight.
The convoy ostensibly launched to protest vaccines and vaccine mandates for truckers crossing the Canada-U.S. border has turned into a siege of the city. Now organizers say they aren’t leaving until all COVID restrictions are lifted.
Some two dozen trucks and 250 or so protestors left from Saturday’s action on Parliament Hill continue to block access to the downtown core and hold the city hostage. The city’s Rideau Centre mall and some 200 stores have been shuttered since last Saturday.
The situation has degenerated into something akin to anarchy with a motley crew of protestors burning open fires and generally making a nuisance of themselves by blaring truck horns at all hours. Residents unable to leave their homes are reporting “belligerent” and “drunk” mobs among the protestors “running amok” and generally spoiling for a fight. Two protestors were arrested earlier this week for assault after an incident over food at a homeless shelter.
Ottawa Centre NDP MPP Joel Harden says he’s received “hundreds” of calls and emails from frustrated residents and that he’s “hearing reports of women, racialized folks, queer, and transgender neighbours harassed walking home or in front of grocery stores.”
Sloly, meanwhile, said during a press conference on Friday that police will be launching a “surge and contain” strategy around the convoy. That was after a press conference on Wednesday in which he suggested that the city’s 1,500-member force was powerless to do anything about the presence of the convoy. He also said at the time that “there may not be a policing solution” to the protest, suggesting that the army might have to be brought in.
Sloly went as far as to raise the spectre of trucks being used as weapons,mentioning U.S.-backed financial support for the protest. He says now that the goal is to “end the demonstration.” What gives? Public pressure for one – and opinion polls. Ottawa residents have been at their wit’s end. The issue has also become an embarrassment, not to mention a national security risk. The hands-off approach is sending more extreme elements among the convoy’s supporters the wrong message that they can pretty much do anything they want. Ottawa mayor Jim Watson also signalled the city’s intention earlier this week to seek a court injunction against the convoy.
But it’s also worth noting that Sloly’s old nemesis Bill Blair is the current minister of emergency preparedness.
Blair was police chief when the largest mass arrest of protestors in Canadian history was carried out at the G20 in Toronto. The minister hasn’t had much publicly to say about the convoy save for a tweet four days ago. “We are closely monitoring the impact that these disruptions are having on nearby neighbourhoods and will continue to provide support to public safety officials managing this event.”
But clearly, they’ve had more to say about Ottawa police’s handling of the situation behind the scenes. The military option suggested by Sloly was a non-starter. It’s not something the government would even seriously consider given the optics. Any military show of force would play right into the hands of protestors. Indeed, some among them have been agitating online for just that, saying Trudeau was preparing to invoke the Emergencies Act. He’s also supposed to be hiding in the U.S., but that’s another rabbit hole we’d rather not go down.
Up until Sloly’s announcement on Friday, it hasn’t gone unnoticed that Ottawa police – and the RCMP dealing with a similar blockade of the Canada-U.S. border in Coutts, Alberta – have been more accommodating to convoy protestors than they have been in the past, for example, to Black and Indigenous protests against police violence and pipelines. They’ve become more of a presence on the streets around the convoy as local frustrations have mounted but continued to allow protestors to fuel their trucks and set up camp in Confederation Park.
The strategy seemed to be to wait for the protest to peter out. But the sense of urgency has been heightened as more protestors are headed to Ottawa as well as Quebec City, Victoria and Toronto this weekend. Reports and chatter online suggest plans are afoot to possibly block hospital row on University Avenue.
On Thursday, Toronto police seemed to be signalling a continuation of the non-interventionist approach tried in Ottawa announcing plans to close off a swath of streets around Queen’s Park. They also advised hospital workers not to wear their uniforms to work, presumably lest they make themselves a target of convoy protestors. That statement was later clarified to say police will be positioned around roadblocks to allow hospital workers to get to their jobs.
Toronto police say they have “robust plans in place” at the same time as they are “speaking with organizers to limit disruption.” By early Friday afternoon, barricades were going up on Bloor. A Toronto police spokesperson has yet to offer comment on questions from NOW on what intelligence, if any, has been gathered on the convoy protestors and what police units are being put on alert for possible deployment.
Mayor John Tory seemed to strike a testy tone in a statement released Thursday but that could just as easily be seen as ambiguous.
Tory said he has met with city manager Chris Murray and Toronto police chief James Ramer and senior police staff and that he supports Toronto police “doing everything they can to protect the safety of Toronto residents and businesses… and avoid the type of situation currently faced by Ottawa residents and businesses.”
It’s a delicate situation for the mayor after last summer’s violent removal by Toronto police of park encampments, made doubly so by the fact that counter-protesters are also expected in the city to confront the convoy.
Then there’s Ontario Premier Doug Ford. After being put on the defensive earlier this week for being slow to condemn the show of Confederate flags and swastikas among protestors in Ottawa last Saturday, Ford seemed to sympathize with the protestors, while sending the conflicting message that those in Ottawa should go home. He also noted the lifting of some COVID restrictions in Ontario as of Monday.
“If people want to come down and protest, God bless them. I understand their frustration. I really do,” he told a Hamilton morning radio show. Maybe Doug’s angling for Erin O’Toole’s job after all. It would certainly fit the precarious script being writ on this pandemic.
