Native Hawaiian Activist Kaniela Ing on Fires, Colonialism & Banyan Tree

we continue to look at the catastrophic wildfires in Maui we turn to kaneira Singh who is the national director of the green New Deal Network ing is a Seventh Generation native Hawaiian from Maui I spoke to him on Thursday night asking him to talk about what's happened to Maui and the historical significance of the heinatown first off thank you for having me and centering this issue I will preface by saying that I've been really busy but when I'm not doing these interviews I just tend to like break down these are really somber times um I was born and raised in Maui I'm kanaka mauli native Hawaiian come from seven generations and our island is on fire our most historic town was set ablazed by wildfires hundreds of people have been evacuated and hospitalized the death toll is climbing and people are searching for loved ones right now so Donald Trump Ron DeSantis Tim Scott Joe manchin oil companies and anyone in power who denies climate change to me are the art are the arsonists here and we're living the climate emergency so it it is sad times right now it's heartening to see the community come together and you know deliver Goods to the families and needs um fundraising has been incredible for the direct relief but what what what I'm wondering personally is once the recovery efforts start to unfold that the cameras are gone uh who's going to be left more powerful or less powerful are people still going to be paying attention when when the recovery work is going to last for years and is that going to make community members stronger or is it going to make the people who have Miss manage the land and water and created the conditions for these fires to happen even more powerful and that's that's what we're focused on at Greenville Network right now can you talk about specifically uh the friends the family what has happened to those that have been devastated by the fires uh particularly in Lahaina can you tell us some of those Escape stories some of what has taken place with the fires so suddenly wiping out this historic City and then talk about the historic nature of Lahaina as the capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom and what that means we're a tropical island here in Maui we're not supposed to have wildfires this came as a shock to everyone there's not enough firefighters here we can't ship them over from the next state we're an island so everyone right now is feeling a bit overwhelmed as it occurred we saw the community members jumping into the ocean which with nowhere else to go just floating and watching their homes being reduced into ashes um the death toll went from 6 to 36 all of a sudden and they're still firefighters Red Cross members out there searching for our loved ones um it was it was apocalyptic the scene was something that uh you know you you would only see in a movie but the reality is like this is becoming quite the norm now and it will become more so in the future Lahaina town is actually it's it's often characterized as a tourist town but the people who live there which should be the focus uh tend to be some of the most rooted native Hawaiians that I've ever met they're the types of their families from Generations ago created aquaculture which like the West is only kind of learning about now um you know I used to work with them to uh like figure out better ways that Noah could manage like Fisheries they're really the keepers of the ancestral knowledge and um you know some of their uh yeah some like most of the folks are evacuated are are um like kanakamali or or other like immigrant um folks and uh my heart goes out to those families when you say it's a tourist town that's because it's historic um so talk about what that means give us a history lesson about Hawaii and about Maui and how it relates to the mainland United States even how it became a part of the United States sure so Lahaina town was a thriving Center of Hawaii it was like the heart of Hawaii before not just statehood but before Hawaii was even a territory of the United States so if you start from one end up Front Street and walk to the other it's like a Disneyland ride of through the colonial timeline of capitalism in Hawaii starting from royalty going to whaling Sandalwood sugar and pineapple tourism to luxury um and to me the fire is a tragic symbol of this trajectories terminal point like where it all ends up if you continue down this this mode of extraction as a way to live but it's also like it also contains the most deep and durable relics of our history of resistance the museums the architecture the infrastructure the Banyan Tree the oldest and largest in the United States which is burnt um 150 years old this year um like it includes all that but also just the fact of how slow it was to develop is a testament to the people powered usually native lead resistance that each industry face along the way you refer to the Raging wildfires as a result of colonial greed explain yeah so there's two facets to this first is climate change the National Weather Service says the cause of this fire was a downed power line and the spread because of hurricane force winds and the spread was caused by dry vegetation and low humidity those are all functions of climate change this isn't disputable this isn't political it's unfortunately it had to become politicized but it's a matter of fact climate pollution corporate polluters that set a blanket a pollution in the air that is overheating our planet contributed caused the conditions that led to this fire in addition there's mismanagement of land the original Big Five oligarchy in Hawaii missionary families that took over our economy and government they continue on today as some of our largest political donors and landowners and corporations they've been grabbing land and diverting water away from this area for a very long time now for generations and Lahaina was actually a wetland you could take a like Viola Church you could have boats circulating the church back back in the day um but you know because they needed water for their corporate Ventures like golf courses and hotels and mono cropping um that that has ended so the natural form of Lahaina would have never caught on fire these disasters are anything but natural so yes Colonial greed in the fact that they caused the pollution that warmed our planet and set hurricanes like this to become the norm and the gross mismanagement of our land and water which the green New Deal actually is about returning both um you know both mitigating climate change building resilience but also returning the stewardship of land and water to the people can you talk about the dry land right now I mean you have uh Hurricane Dora hundreds of miles away um the wind was intense uh but the drought that existed that relationship to climate change yeah that's right so we growing up on this island we saw maybe one or two fires and they're very contained when things got to this drought Factor it's never been anything close to this this shock even even like the climate scientists that I've worked with over the years were were shocked by this by this fire and a lot of it has to do with these dry conditions growing up my dad would drive us to church and he'd point out to the sugar cane and he'd say but when you're my age all this sugarcane would be gone and I was like you know okay sure uh this is it's such an essential part of Maui but he was right the sugar is gone and the reason why is because one of these big five oligarchical corporations that I spoke of knew that the sugar wasn't profitable but they continued mono cropping most of the island in order to get some tax breaks for agriculture now I grew up in a community where it would rain cane Ash on us and it was like fun I didn't realize we're all getting asthma we're saying environmental justice Community um so but you know there were people that fought against the cane burning um and the corporation ended up blaming the activists uh for the for the sugar shutting down pitting the union workers against the community um the result now is just like a fallow really dry land across the whole Central Valley of our Island um and really if you know if community members and union members were to unite and have been organized uh years ago um we could have had a much different future and uh that's still something uh that I think we we should continue working to build is that is that labor and environmental uh Unity can you talk about the April survey of homeless people unhoused people I think it was something like 704 unhoused people in Maui County among them 244 suffering from mental health disabilities the unhoused crisis among Native Americans uh native Hawaiians and what do you know about native Hawaiians uh who were unhoused and how the wildfires have affected them yeah uh uh I think there's a certain perception of native Hawaiians who are unsheltered um that's not that does not fit with reality some of the unsheltered Hawaiian communities that continue today were occupations of land I was getting seized um and they're like look if we don't want to cooperate with this with this new extractive economy that you all created so we're going to live on by ourselves in our own community on this beach we're going to govern ourselves and they're quite organized and they're living in a way that's subsistent and in harmony with nature now it's not to be glamorized a lot of a lot of these folks face some really dire conditions not being a part of this capitalist system but a lot of them are doing it based on really strong and sensible beliefs now when a climate crisis hits when a disaster hits it's going to impact these people first and worse no doubt and we need to make sure that both relief and Recovery efforts in the longer term are prioritizing the low-income and Indigenous people that that are some some are still unaccounted for some don't even have IDs and you know they need to be friend of mine with it with everything we do from you know day Zero when the disaster breaks two years out when we recovering the wildfires occurred on the same day that President Biden said in an interview that he had practically declared a climate emergency but he has not actually formally done that what would that mean I just been frantically trying to make sure that my loved ones are okay but I also work on climate this is my job and I as soon as I start thinking about that statement from President Biden I just get so incensed this is a climate emergency There's no practical practically declared it and you either believe it or not and I think as bad as Republicans have been by denying climate Democrats are just as culpable by by not doing enough scientists say that you need to be investing at least one trillion dollars a year in the clean energy transition we need to end and phase out deny all new fossil fuel permits and and really empower the communities that build back ourselves democratically that's that's the solution for it and President Biden announced his second term but he hasn't told us how he's going to finish the job he needs to lay out that Vision what we've been demanding from a green new deal if he wants communities that got him elected to come out that base of climate voters that happened to be predominantly black indigenous and low-income people like we need something for looking to come out because right now like I'm not even thinking about voting right like nobody in Lahaina is thinking about whether or not they support Biden like give us something you know at least let us see be seen uh so you know I think that's that sense of urgency even even me who who is in this climate work full time and see these events unfold elsewhere until it hits you at home and it's people you know grocery stores you shop at schools your kids go to your church after you be burnt down you're not going to understand the urgency like it is shocking we're not talking 10 years from now we're having these things are happening right now it could happen to your home tomorrow that's the urgency we're dealing with and we need to act accordingly so no practically speaking like we need to move now and do everything we can and can you tell us more about the importance of indigenous wisdom and practices in addressing the climate catastrophe sure yeah so going into line of the people that as you live there for Generations are the keepers of some of the most profound indigenous knowledge that I have ever met they understood subsistence fishery how native plants were buffers against like you know disasters uh how to um you know create regenerative agricultural practices uh and it's that it's that view of the world where um you know our success isn't determined by how much we afford but but rather how much we produce for others and share and where like our um our economy is is not based on how well the rich are doing but how how how many people how many of us can actually Thrive like it's that it's it's not just indigenous knowledge but it's that value system that really needs to be uh re-established so you know I think over the years especially in in my line of work there's been more resources for indigenous folks to lead Frontline fights against Bad projects but the intervention that really needs to happen is indigenous leaders also need to be resourced to build the good they need to be the purveyors of an architects of the the new green and like uh Community rooted world that that's still possible even in these dire times finally would you like to leave us with some images that you have been living through over these last few days like the Banyan Tree where you show us uh uh when you put out on social media the before and after the wildfires but other images or stories of people's bravery and trying to preserve what you have known for so long yeah I mean as as we're speaking there's people that still haven't found their loved ones um a lot of the friends that I grew up with like I come from a lower income neighborhood they're firefighters I ran into one on the way here and I'm just like hey you are doing a great job and you're just sweating and like started crying and you know barely looked like he hasn't slept in days uh hotels are letting residents in without cost to sleep multiple businesses are just letting people drop off goods and they're shipping it three to four times a day they're leaving their doors open 24 hours so there is that sense of you know this is an island we're always together and um that sense of mutual Aid and solidarity is really carrying us through um and it's been it's been quite remarkable to witness um but you know don't want to leave you with some toxic positivity either like these are hard times and unless we take urgent action now um it'll only get worse and what is the do you feel is the most important thing that President Biden the federal government people should be pushing for right now well right now we need direct aid but there needs to be a longer focus on um recovery that these we can't rebuild the community in a few weeks it's going to take years and we need to do it intentionally not just making sure not just bringing us back to the status quo because the status quo is what led us here but making sure that we have more democratic and Community controlled institutions that come out of this unfortunately the groups that are best poised to deploy direct Aid because of their institutional connections are also the most likely to enable disaster capitalists from exploiting this situation so we need to create we need to understand that you know as we're like trying as people want to help that their resourcing groups that have an eye towards Community organizations to to organizers they'll actually be there once the cameras leave and we'll be rebuilding uh from the ground up over the course of the long run and one more time can you tell us why the Banyan tree is so important yeah I mean the Banyan tree is is so iconic there's like 16 trunks it's the largest in the United States it just turned 150 years old in April and the images of it being completely toasted is heartbreaking now I have hope because trees have Deep Roots especially of that age that it will continue on and uh you know that's that's the vision in my mind right like as we rebuild as a community as we realize the vision of a green New Deal nationally and globally um the ban entry also regrow these leaves and is a positive symbol for what's it called the national director of the green New Deal Network Seventh Generation native Hawaiian speaking to us from Maui and I especially thank my little pup Zazu for staying quiet during that interview which makes me think about all of the fauna and the Flora destroyed as well uh on Maui and of course most importantly the people

Channel: Democracy Now!

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Id: Hi5v7Epz6Xo

Length: 21min 22sec (1282 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 11 2023