Video still from Lax’yip Firekeepers.
The Lax’yip Firekeepers have stated that they are committed “to defending Gitxsan territory from industrial megaprojects”.
The Gitxsan lax’yip (also known as territories) occupy an area of 33,000 square kilometres in northwest British Columbia.
The Lax’yip Firekeepers are a Gitxsan youth-led initiative focused on land protection, legal education, and intergenerational continuity.
Their founding organizer is Hooxi’i (Kolin Sutherland-Wilson). He is a Gitxsan researcher, land defender, and a hereditary name holder of Wilp Git’luuhl’um’hetxwit, a Fireweed Clan House of Anspayaxw.
This is Kolin speaking about Gitxsan opposition to the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission (PRGT) pipeline this past February 2026.
PBI-Canada has met Kolin three times.
The first time was in November 2021 at the time of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) raid against land defenders resisting the Coastal GasLink pipeline on Wet’suwet’en territory.
Then we saw him again on a PBI-Canada convened webinar in March 2024 about Gitxsan and Gitanyow resistance to extractive megaprojects.
And then again in October 2025 at the time of the sentencing hearing for Indigenous land defenders who had been arrested by the RCMP C-IRG in November 2021.
We note that the Lax’yip Firekeepers have asked for people to stand with them in opposition to the PRGT pipeline and to “continue to amplify voices and existing messages from the Gitanyow Hereditary Chiefs, Lax’yip Firekeepers, and Huwlip in opposition of the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline.”
Instagram post from Lax’yip Firekeepers.
Keeping in mind the post above, PBI-Canada met with Lax Ganeada Hereditary Simooget (Chief) Watakhayetsxw (Deborah Good) along with Wet’suwet’en Heredity Chief Na’Moks in Smithers during a visit to the territory in October 2025.
To follow the Lax’yip Firekeepers on social media, go to their website, their Instagram account, and their Facebook page.
Additional reading: Lax’yip Firekeepers march in Victoria against PRGT pipeline; Filipino youth draw parallels in the defence of ancestral lands (PBI-Canada article, February 11, 2026).
