Canadian truckers driving to the United States must be vaccinated following a government mandate, or lose their job. In response to these measures, these truckers launched a convoy through Ottawa, the nation's capital. This was initially thwarted by GoFundMe and the Canadian police, but the crypto community decided to help.
The BBC reports today that the protest has been declared a state of emergency by Jim Watson, the mayor of Ottawa. According to Watson, the protest is "completely out of control". The police are currently outnumbered by the protesters.
Seizure of GoFundMe funds
The protesters were supported by a GoFundMe page designed to provide supplies for the truckers. However, after interference of the Canadian police, the GoFundMe page was suspended and the truckers' fuel stolen by police.
At the request of the police, GoFundMe halted donations to the protest. This naturally enraged the donors supporting the cause. The nearly 10 million Canadian dollars raised was taken away first; GoFundMe wanted to put the money into other charities.
The investors did not leave it at that and complained. It was only then that the platform withdrew from the funds and returned it to the initial backers. The answer to central parties obstructing transactions? Bitcoin.
Bitcoin as a saving Grace
Thanks to the decentralized nature of bitcoin, no one has power over the funds. The Canadian police and government are therefore unable to intercept donated funds. The investors saw this too.
Someone under the alias of 'Honkhonk Hodl' set up a donation page for this reason via Tallycoin, a platform where people – instead of Canadian dollars – can donate bitcoins. This allows the donations to continue without interference from the police or any other body of government.
Thanks in part to a very generous giver, who donated 2.2 bitcoin, the current donations have increased to more than 880,000,000 satoshi. This is equivalent to 8.8 bitcoin, or 330,000 euros. These donations will be donated directly to the truckers, without the intervention of a central party.
Distribution of the donations
Finbold reports that the group must coordinate how the funds are used. All Bitcoin collected is held in a wallet that requires multiple signatures to spend the collected money. In this way, the wallet removes a single point of failure. It also forces the group to coordinate how the money is used, as no individual has the ability to transfer the Bitcoin.”
There is only a small problem with getting the value of the bitcoins to the truckers. If the bitcoins are used to buy supplies, they must be physically delivered to the truckers, and the mayor of Ottawa can stop this.
Problems caused by state of emergency
Now that the mayor of Ottawa has declared a state of emergency, the city will be given additional powers. An example of this is equipment for emergency services.
The BBC, which reported on the state of emergency, says the mayor is not giving out specific details about the measures he could impose. "Police on Sunday said they would step up enforcement, including possible arrests of those who tried to help protesters by bringing them supplies such as fuel, toilet paper and food," the BBC said. So it is now becoming more difficult to get supplies to the truckers.
Canada pushing Bitcoin price up
The recent upward movement of Bitcoins value has coincided with good news. The Canadian branch of KPMG, one of the 'big four' accountancy firms in the world, has officially added Bitcoin and Ethereum to the corporate portfolio.
KPMG Canada's Benjie Thomas speaks highly of the emerging crypto sector in the press announcement:
“This investment reflects our belief that institutional adoption of crypto assets and blockchain technology will continue to grow and become a regular part of the asset mix,”
It is not yet clear how many tokens of Bitcoin and Ethereum are involved. Either way, big names such as this taking the step to officially embrace cryptocurrencies, it is very positive news. It thus adds to the list of companies such as MicroStrategy and Tesla that have also embraced bitcoin in such a way.
"Bitcoin for President"
Another positive movement within crypto coming from the North American country as one of the candidates for Prime Minister seems to want to take the nation forward in terms of digitalization. Pierre Poilievre, currently a member of Parliament for Carleton, said: "I've learned a lot about #Bitcoin."