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NOTE: If you would like to have a history item, or news event, considered for posting, please send to: daniel.paul@ns.sympatico.ca
History Items
And
First Nations News Events
I sent out an Email yesterday related to a sick piece of hate mail that I had received and got loads of advice, thanks! I will remove the material from this page at noon today, March 9, 2009. After that, if you wish to have a copy of the offensive original Email, send me a memo and I'll forward a copy.
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Halifax Chronical Herald
Mi’kmaq social worker to receive national award
Glode proud to be part of team working to improve lives of young aboriginals
By MARY ELLEN MacINTYRE Truro Bureau
Wed. Mar 4 - 5:21 AM
INDIAN BROOK — Some might disagree, but Joan Glode says she never accomplished anything on her own.
At least, that’s how she explains becoming a recipient of this year’s National Aboriginal Achievement Awards for public service.
"This award is about the team of workers here: It’s not just for me; it’s about the work we do," said Ms. Glode, who was founding president of the Micmac Native Friendship Centre and founding director of Mik’maw Family and Children’s Services of Nova Scotia.
The team Ms. Glode refers to includes the social workers and staff members who work in offices and shelters in Indian Brook, Millbrook, Eskasoni and Waycobah.
"I guess it all started in about 1975 when I was going into the Micmac Native Friendship Centre one morning," she said during an interview in her office Tuesday.
"I was putting the key in the lock and there were two kids sitting in the doorway."
"I took them in and made some tea and one of the kids said to me, ‘I grew up in foster care but I think I came from a certain native community — can you tell me who I am?’ " she recalled.
"These kids didn’t know who they were; they couldn’t speak their own language, didn’t know their traditions because they were in foster care outside their own community."
The idea behind the creation of a community-based children’s service came from a need to address that need.
Mindful of the generational damage wrought by the Indian residential school system, Ms. Glode nevertheless believes there is hope for the future.
"We have to concentrate on how we spread the hope, the joy and the laughter of our culture and bring up our kids in a good way," she said.
"We have to provide alternative arrangements for some children and we have to provide support to the families, because most of the time the problem isn’t about abuse; it’s about poverty and a lack of resources or knowledge."
Ms. Glode said she has been blessed with inspiring mentors all her life.
"Every day of my mother’s life she devoted to her children, and she was determined we would be educated and learn to look after ourselves," she said.
One of her main sources of inspiration was the late Noel Doucette, former Chapel Island chief and one of the founders of the Union of Nova Scotia Indians.
"He was a good, peaceful man who wanted to make sure things were done right for everyone," she said.
Ms. Glode is considered something of a pioneer. She was the first native person in the Atlantic region to earn a master’s degree in social work from the Maritime School of Social Work.
She and 13 others will receive their awards from the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation at a gala event in Winnipeg on Friday. The event will be televised on Global TV and APTN at a later date.
( mmacintyre@herald.ca)
’We have to concentrate on how we spread the hope, the joy and the laughter of our culture and bring up our kids in a good way. . . . We have to provide support to the families, because most of the time the problem isn’t about abuse; it’s about poverty and a lack of resources or knowledge.’
Joan GlodeSocial worker
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GLOBE AND MAIL - February 27, 2009
ABORIGINAL LAND CLAIMS
Revoking a governor's Feb. 14 decree, B.C. moves to recognize native rights. By JUSTINE HUNTER
February 27, 2009
VICTORIA -- The volumes of the province's legal history, bound in stiff tan buckram cloth, fill a bookshelf in a corner of Mike de Jong's legislature office. In the next four weeks, the Aboriginal Affairs Minister hopes to bring in a new statute that will take precedence over all of them.
It is the most expedient path to untangling hundreds of B.C. laws that are rooted in a contentious proclamation issued on Valentine's Day 150 years ago.
With the proposed Recognition and Reconciliation Act, Mr. de Jong, along with a small team that includes the Premier's deputy minister and the province's top three native leaders, have decided it is possible to rewrite that history.
On Feb. 14, 1859, British Columbia's new governor, James Douglas, proclaimed that all the lands in British Columbia - and all minerals below the surface - belonged to the Crown.
The commander-in-chief of the newly minted colony was preoccupied with controlling the gold rush, but, with his decree, he dismissed any claims of the aboriginal population in B.C. - in fact, the governor described the lands as "unoccupied."
Premier Gordon Campbell has pledged his support for a new law to enshrine aboriginal rights and title in law. With it, he hopes to create "partnerships and prosperity" through shared decision-making and revenue-sharing.
The province is also drafting a new proclamation, one that would provide the language of reconciliation that doesn't come across in the dry realm of legal statutes.
"You can't undo history but you can rectify it," said Ed John, grand chief of the First Nations Summit.
It is principled stuff, but it has generated high anxiety for the province's resource industry.
Aboriginal leaders have produced a draft mining action plan, based on the notion that they will soon have the province's formal backing to their claims for a share in the control and profits of mining activity in B.C.
"For our continued survival, dignity and well-being," the plan states, "any and all development of our lands, territories and resources requires our free, prior and informed consent."
The plan calls not just for consultation; it foresees natives "benefiting from all phases" of the mining process, including revenue-sharing, employment quotas and contracts for mining supply. There are action plans, too, for forestry, fisheries and energy - anything that deals with the economics of land and resources in B.C.
"It's not enough for a mining company to go to government for a permit," said Mr. John, one of the six key people involved in developing the proposed recognition law. "It's not going to happen any more. ... The reality of conducting business will change."
The details of the proposed recognition law are still under wraps. It is expected to create mechanisms for involving native communities when a company wants to invest in a new mine, for example.
Just how the rules will change is still a huge uncertainty for those outside the drafting process.
"We are all a little bit skeptical and a little bit worried," said Pierre Gratton, president of the Mining Association of B.C.
Nirvana, to his industry, would be a time when all the province's land claims are settled. In the meantime, it would like to see a system that is rules-based and predictable. "Who makes the decision is less important," he said. "But it can't be something that finishes with a plebiscite at the end."
The mining industry isn't the only sector where land-claims issues have held up investment, but a number of mining projects are tied up in litigation or, like Northgate Minerals Corp.'s Kemess North gold mine, have been killed outright.
"What we are seeing," Mr. Gratton said, "is a political struggle over B.C.'s resources - over control and who benefits from them - between the province and first nations. And how they solve it will determine whether or not industry decides this is a good place to invest."
If the law is passed before the May 12 election - it's an ambitious time frame - it may still take years for the resource industry to decide if recognition is a good thing for its interests.
In the meantime, the province continues with business as usual in the courts. In the B.C. Court of Appeal yesterday, the province won the right to challenge a landmark ruling that found the Tsilhqot'in Nation has aboriginal title.
Another of the key players in drafting the recognition law, Chief Shawn Atleo, is also tied up in court on behalf of his Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council in a case where the Crown's opening statement denies the existence of his people.
"What a place to begin a discussion about how we are to co-exist," Mr. Atleo said yesterday.
Will the province withdraw from such court battles on the day it passes a new law? It would be a concrete way to demonstrate the spirit of reconciliation Mr. Campbell is offering.
Sir James's legacy:
Much of the conflict over land claims in British Columbia can be traced to a single document that was issued during the colony's founding year.
The past:
On Feb. 14, 1859, Governor James Douglas issued a proclamation that reads in part: "All the lands in British Columbia, and all the Mines and Minerals therein, belong to the Crown in fee." Land not reserved for townsites would be available at a price of ten shillings per acre, although the government could also "reserve such portions of the unoccupied Crown Lands" as it saw fit.
The present:
On Feb. 16, 2009, Lieutenant-Governor Steven Point read the government's Throne Speech:
"This government is working with First Nations to develop a Recognition and Reconciliation Act that will ... acknowledge, and place in a provincial statutory context, that Indigenous people have long lived throughout British Columbia and that this fact does not require proof. It will recognize constitutionally established Aboriginal rights and title, and will facilitate partnerships and prosperity through shared decision-making and revenue-sharing. ... It will create process certainty for third parties and Indigenous Nations as they pursue economic development."
The future:
A new royal proclamation is being considered by the provincial government, one that would revoke part of the 1859 law. The wording is not yet public but it might say, in effect: "We are sorry, this province was in fact occupied long before Sir James set eyes on its tall timbers and lucrative gold fields."
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Halifax Herald
Racism blamed in cold cases
UN calls on Ottawa to probe deaths, disappearances of aboriginal women
BY SUE BAILEY The Canadian Press
Tue. Nov 25, 2008 - 8:35 AM
OTTAWA — The United Nations is calling on the Harper government to investigate why hundreds of deaths and disappearances of aboriginal women remain unsolved.
It’s asking Ottawa to report back in a year on the status of more than 500 cases that "have neither been fully investigated nor attracted priority attention, with the perpetrators remaining unpunished."
The UN committee on the elimination of discrimination against women wants Canada to "urgently carry out thorough investigations" to trace how and why the justice system failed.
"It also urges the state party to carry out an analysis of those cases in order to determine whether there is a racialized pattern to the disappearances and take measures to address the problem if that is the case," says one of more than 40 recommendations.
Sharon McIvor doesn’t need another study. The aboriginal activist who has worked for years with families of missing native women says racism is the all-too-common thread.
"Absolutely," she said. "I’m an aboriginal woman that’s grown up in this country. I know it’s racism."
McIvor, 60, recalled walking home from the movies after dark as a teenager in her hometown of Merritt, B.C., near the Lower Nicola reserve.
"If a car came by, I would hit the bushes because I was free game — I was a young, aboriginal girl. And we had young aboriginal girls picked up, raped and murdered. And they didn’t follow up on it then, either."
A federally funded $5-million study by the Native Women’s Association of Canada concludes that 510 aboriginal girls and women have vanished or been murdered since 1980. It calls for an emergency strategy.
Federal and provincial justice ministers said last September that they’re improving how missing-person cases are handled, especially those involving native women.
Special task forces have been formed in Vancouver and Edmonton since dozens of women working the sex trade in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside disappeared over several years with little police or media response. Many were aboriginal.
Investigators finally banded together under pressure from distraught families and a series by the Vancouver Sun to zero in on now-convicted serial killer Robert Pickton.
McIvor says aboriginal girls and women from all walks of life are still being targeted, their disappearances treated with uneven and too-often muted reaction.
She cited the unsolved case of Daleen Kay Bosse, who vanished after a night out with friends in Saskatoon on May 18, 2004. There was no hint that the aspiring teacher and photographer, just 26 years old, would simply abandon her life.
Her heart-broken mother, Pauline Muskego, spoke publicly a year later about the comparative lack of media interest.
"My daughter’s face has never been shown nationally," she said.
McIvor says the general public mistakenly thinks such victims are living high-risk lifestyles.
"And that’s not true. Her risk is she’s an aboriginal woman."
No comment from federal officials was immediately available.
Leilani Farha, a spokeswoman for the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action, says government efforts to date are "minimal."
"There needs to be a proper inquiry into what’s happened to these women and what the deficiencies in the law enforcement system were and continue to be.
"I think it’s plain that the government of Canada is failing aboriginal women in this country."
The UN committee also wants Ottawa to set minimum standards for welfare to better protect the most vulnerable citizens across Canada. And it raises alarms about lack of shelters for battered women, and Conservative government cuts that wiped out the Court Challenges Program — funding that helped advance minority rights.
’If a car came by, I would hit the bushes because I was free game — I was a young, aboriginal girl.’
SHARON McIVOR Aboriginal activist
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Halifax Chronicle Herald
Condemning Halifax’s founder
By DANIEL N. PAUL - Thu. Oct 30 - 4:47 AM
"The Indians who scalped your forefathers were open enemies, and had good reason for what they did. They were fighting for their country, which they loved, as we have loved it in these latter years. … What God in His bounty had given them, they defended like brave and true men. They fought the old pioneers of our civilization for a hundred and thirty years, and during all that time they were true to each other and to their country …"
Honourable Joseph Howe, 1867
The Englishmen who scalped our forefathers, mothers and children, and who authorized bounty hunters of many races to do so, did not have good reason for what they did; they were stealing another nation’s land. Our ancestors were trying to protect their property and prevent their extinction. Logic tells me that what they did was above reproach – at least it would be in the eyes of reasonable people.
However, when it comes to Edward Cornwallis, reasonable people seem to be scarce. I find it almost incomprehensible that supposedly modern, civilized individuals can stoop to defending colonial English barbarism. They do so by recalling outrages allegedly committed by Mi’kmaq warriors – the Dartmouth incident for instance.
The following is what Cornwallis actually used as an excuse to issue his Oct. 2, 1749, scalp proclamation (quoted from An Unsettled Conquest, The British Campaign Against the Peoples of Acadia – Geoffrey Plank):
"In the summer of 1749, as a preliminary step to facilitate the introduction of settlers across the peninsula, Cornwallis … hoped that he might be able to convince the Mi’kmaq to make room for his settlers voluntarily.
"But given the long history of armed hostilities between the English-speakers and the Mi’kmaq in the 18th century, such a peaceful outcome was hardly likely. The first shots were fired by English speakers, probably New Englanders, who assumed that the Mi’kmaq would resist their efforts to occupy land.
"In the summer of 1749, a group of men whom the Mi’kmaq and the French identified as ‘English’ arrived at Canso with the apparent intention of reviving the local fishery. The newcomers discovered a community of Mi’kmaq women and children whose fathers and husbands had gone away to hunt and fish. According to the Mi’kmaq, the English killed 20 women and children. In September, when a second ship arrived at Canso from Boston, Mi’kmaq warriors seized the vessel and took 20 of the crew captive.
"Perhaps hoping to avert a full-scale war, they released the prisoners, but soon thereafter the fighting spread, first to the isthmus of Chignecto and finally to the vicinity of Halifax itself. Cornwallis was ready for this news; even before it arrived, he had begun making tentative plans for a campaign against the peninsula’s Mi’kmaq bands. He vowed this would be the last Anglo-Mi’kmaq war and that there would be no peace agreement at the end of the fighting. Instead, he declared, he would ‘root’ the Mi’kmaq out forever. The governor and his advisors predicted that expelling the Mi’kmaq would be ‘very practicable,’ and ‘no very difficult matter’."
I suggest the governor’s defenders read Rebellion and Savagery, a well-researched history book about his participation in the Jacobite Rebellion. The more reasonable among them might become non-defenders.
I have a question for his defenders: If, instead of the Mi’kmaq, Cornwallis had placed a bounty on the heads of Acadians, women and children included, would you still be defending him?
Daniel N. Paul is the author of several books, including First Nations History: We Were Not the Savages.
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Halifax Chronicle Herald
Defending Halifax’s founding father
By John Boileau - Tue. Oct 14 - 6:38 AM
POOR OLD Governor Edward Cornwallis, subjected once again to a barrage of criticism and demands that his name be erased from all public places because of claims he attempted to extinguish the Mi’kmaq (Oct. 3 article). Sadly, those who want to remove his name are looking for a scapegoat where one doesn’t exist. It’s not Cornwallis who should be blamed, but the system at the time.
The Mi’kmaq were among the earliest aboriginals to meet Europeans. By the time contact became more frequent in the 1500s, the Mi’kmaq might have numbered as many as 50,000, although 20,000 to 30,000 may be a more reasonable estimate.
Thousands of Mi’kmaq died as a result of this contact before Cornwallis. Shortly after permanent French settlement began in Acadia, both French and Mi’kmaq noticed a decline in the native population, although they did not initially identify the cause as European diseases. Mi’kmaq Chief Membertou told Acadian chronicler Marc Lescarbot that when he was young, his people had been "as thickly planted there as the hairs upon his head;" but since the arrival of the French, their numbers had diminished dramatically.
Additional Mi’kmaq deaths followed from the disastrous French attempt to retake Louisbourg from the New Englanders who captured it in 1745. The fleet sent the next year anchored at Birch Cove in Bedford Basin, where hundreds of sick and dying Frenchmen were put ashore to recover. Thousands of Mi’kmaq caught their diseases and spread them throughout the province. One-third to one-half of the entire aboriginal population of mainland Nova Scotia may have died during the fall and winter of 1746-47.
When Cornwallis arrived in 1749, he only controlled mainland Nova Scotia, so any edicts he issued had no authority over most Mi’kmaq territory. Cape Breton Island, Prince Edward Island, eastern New Brunswick and the Gaspe were under the French until 1763.
Cornwallis’s orders were lawful at the time and he had the full authority to issue them. Legal authorities of the day would be unable to find any charges to lay against him and, even if they did, any court would have dismissed them or found him not guilty.
The 18th century was a much harsher time than our own. Ordinary people were subject to a wide range of punishments for common crimes. Hanging was used not only for murderers, but also against perpetrators of property crimes. Children, youths, women and the mentally ill were not exempt.
Rather than accuse Cornwallis, the blame should be focused on the laws of the times. But laws are not concrete objects, and it’s much easier to demonize an individual than a concept. We cannot simply apply today’s norms to the past. The hug-a-tree, save-a-whale crowd would be incomprehensible to 18th-century citizens, who regarded all resources – whether natural, or, in some cases, human – as theirs to be exploited.
Cornwallis was not the monster his detractors would have us believe. The man who founded Halifax was a middle-ranking career soldier with influential family connections. When he arrived in Nova Scotia as its governor, the 37-year-old colonel was an 18-year veteran of the army, a member of Parliament, and the twin brother of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Contemporaries described him as "a brave sensible young man of great temper and good nature," as well as one of "approved courage and fidelity."
The governor was unstinting and outspoken in his attempts to obtain additional funding for the colony from the British authorities, frequently to no avail. He left Halifax in 1752, in ill health and disillusioned by difficulties with the Board of Trade and Plantations, and recommenced his army career.
Cornwallis had the ultimate say in the choice of a location for the new settlement, and time has approved the wisdom of his choice of a hillside on the western shore of the harbour. Today, Halifax is Atlantic Canada’s largest, leading and most vibrant city.
After meeting with Cornwallis and promising to be friendly with the British, the Mi’kmaq soon treacherously attacked some unarmed men working on the Dartmouth side and killed four of them. While I am not a proponent of blaming victims for crimes perpetrated upon them, if the Mi’kmaq had kept their word and not murdered the settlers, the edict offering a bounty for each aboriginal – dead or alive – or for a scalp would probably not have been issued.
I personally deplore what happened to the Mi’kmaq, but no one can change it or rewrite history. Although I have no particular compunction to defend Cornwallis against his most recent spate of accusers, someone must stand up against those who unfairly malign the founder of our fair city.
John Boileau is the author of seven books about Nova Scotia’s history.
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Defending the indefensible. It was only English British governors who issued proclamations for the scalps of Indigenous women and children. It was not a practice that the English Crown had enshrined in law.
The incident in Dartmouth may have been carried out by a few Mi'kmaq, if indeed it was not done by some of the bloodthirsty mercenaries that the British government had imported into Nova Scotia to carry out its agenda, or if it even occurred. In any event, do you decide to eliminate an entire race of people because of the criminal actions of a few? I think not. If so, for instance if a few Irishmen had murdered a few Englishmen, would there have a proclamation issued for the scalps of all Irishmen?
Governor Cornwallis's brother Frederick was not the archbishop of Canterbury when Edward arrived here, he was appointed to the post in 1768.
I would recommend that John Boileau read a copy of the new Edition of my book "First Nation History - We Were Not the Savages - Third Edition" http://www.danielnpaul.com/WeWereNotTheSavages-Mi'kmaqHistory.html , then contact me daniel.paul@ns.sympatico.ca for a discussion.
Edward Cornwallis, by condoning the cruel performance of the soldiers under his command in Scotland - during the Jacobite Rebellion - and the issuance of two scalp proclamations for the scalps of Mi'kmaq, and any assisting them, has proven that he had a sadistic streak that does not permit him hero worship!
Lets read about him, not idolize him
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Halifax Chronicle Herald
Protesters condemn Cornwallis
By MICHAEL LIGHTSTONE Staff Reporter
Fri. Oct 3 - 5:39 AM
On a day when Nova Scotia’s colonial past was celebrated in Halifax with musical performances, an 18th-century costume ball and other government-funded events, a darker part of the province’s history was marked in a peaceful park in the city’s south end.
A handful of native-rights supporters gathered in the rain by a statue of Halifax’s founder, Edward Cornwallis. They were there to condemn his actions of more than 250 years ago with respect to indigenous inhabitants of the region.
In 1749, Mr. Cornwallis placed a bounty on the heads of the Mi’kmaq people and therefore should not have such public places as a park and school named after him, a protester said Thursday.
Welcome to the flip side of the Democracy 250 project — the official celebration of parliamentary democracy in Canada.
The federal and provincial governments are spending about $10.5 million on the anniversary project. Thursday’s Democracy 250 program included references to aboriginal culture and a salute to other historical elements of Nova Scotia society.
Oct. 2 is the anniversary of the day Cornwallis issued his bounty proclamation. Rally organizers, who’ve started an online petition to purge the Cornwallis name from public sites, say all public honours must be removed because "no individual who attempted to extinguish a people should be held in esteem in a public manner."
Metro teacher Cheryl LeBlanc-Weldon, who is spearheading the anti-Cornwallis effort, was hoping for a larger turnout Thursday but said bad weather probably persuaded many to stay away. She said she would try to set up another rally in the park.
Ms. Weldon also plans to make a presentation to Halifax regional council about renaming Cornwallis Park.
In the meantime, she and her supporters have scored a moral victory.
According to a Sept. 24 letter from a senior bureaucrat with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the Canadian Coast Guard is not intending to use the Cornwallis name on any new ships put into service.
The letter, shown to The Chronicle Herald, says the coast guard vessel already named after Cornwallis is to be replaced.
"Our ship-naming policy is currently being reviewed," the letter said. "According to our review of the ship-naming policy, the name Edward Cornwallis will not meet the criteria for naming future vessels."
It says the revised policy "will significantly restrict the naming criteria and require a more robust research process."
mlightstone@herald.ca
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The (Halifax) Chronicle Herald
Some in Amherst, Que., ashamed of name
Tue. Sep 23 - 4:46 AM
MONTREAL (CP) — People in a tiny Quebec municipality named after controversial British general Jeffery Amherst are weighing whether to shed his name from their history.
Some people in the town of about 1,400 people, which comprises three villages tucked away in the Laurentians north of Montreal, want to distance themselves from the 18th-century soldier.
While Amherst was instrumental in ending French rule in Canada in 1760, his reputation was later tarnished in correspondence with another soldier outlining the possibility of giving smallpox-infected blankets to natives.
The approach has been described by some as an early form of germ warfare, although there is heated debate among historians as to whether that is how the disease spread.
In an open letter in the local paper, former mayor Andre Lord says "Amherst was a bit like a hysterical Saddam Hussein.
"Being identified with the name of an individual like Jeffery Amherst is completely unacceptable," Lord wrote.
"It should be known that if Gen. Amherst were alive in our times, he would be considered a war criminal and would be dragged before the international war tribunal for what he did to his Indian enemies."
But the proposed name change also has its detractors.
Residents of one of the villages, Saint-Remi-d’Amherst, have already said they don’t want to change their name and tabled a petition with 350 names last May opposing the switch.
One of their chief concerns is that changing the name will cost them in the wallet and do more to hurt their heritage and history.
One history professor says the evidence against Amherst isn’t even conclusive.
"His intent is clear and what he would have liked is obvious, but whether he succeeded at it and whether people did what he suggested is ambiguous," says Concordia University’s Ronald Rudin.
So the municipality has put it to the people. Residents have until the end of the month to vote on whether they want the change.
Amherst’s name is prevalent all over North America including towns in Nova Scotia and Massachusetts.
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Halifax Herald - ACROSS NOVA SCOTIA - August 16, 2008
D’Entremont: Cornwallis sites don’t tell whole tale
Nova Scotia’s minister of Acadian affairs says he’s no fan of Edward Cornwallis, celebrated as the founder of Halifax.
Cornwallis was a career soldier whom the English appointed as governor of Nova Scotia in 1749, and he has been a controversial figure in the province’s history because of his attempts to destroy the Mi’kmaq.
Last week a teacher from West Chezzetcook started an online petition to rename any parks, schools or other sites bearing the colonial administrator’s name.
The movement resonates with Chris d’Entremont, who said he probably has some Mi’kmaq ancestry himself.
"Taking the Mi’kmaq thing out of it, Cornwallis was not very just to Acadians either," he said Friday. "I’d almost support it."
Mr. d’Entremont said Cornwallis was a key figure in the 1755 expulsion of the Acadian people, which he called "a very dark time in Nova Scotia’s history."
But the minister said he won’t push the premier to strip Cornwallis’s name from public sites.
He said he would be satisfied with more information being posted at sites like Cornwallis Park in south-end Halifax. "There should be a good interpretive panel there that would explain two sides of the story," Mr. d’Entremont said.
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Cornwallis not going anywhere
Government unlikely to heed the demands to remove his name from public places
By JEFFREY SIMPSON Staff Reporter, Fri. Aug 15 - 7:04 AM
Nova Scotia’s Heritage Minister has played down the latest call to remove the name of Halifax founder Edward Cornwallis from public places.
"Changing a name does not change what happened," Bill Dooks told reporters Thursday. "I have no thought of doing that at this particular time.
"I cannot change the past."
Cornwallis was a career soldier whom the English appointed as governor of Nova Scotia in 1749 and has been a controversial figure in the province’s history because of his attempts to wipe out the Mi’kmaq.
Cheryl LeBlanc-Weldon, a teacher from West Chezzetcook, started an online petition last week to rename any parks, schools or other sites bearing the colonial administrator’s name.
"All peoples have certainly gone through challenges and some more severe than others," Mr. Dooks said. "Things happened in the past that we couldn’t control and we’re not very proud of that, but we’re focused on the future."
Mr. Dooks said he’s committed to promoting the province’s history "in an appropriate way" through "our dance, our music, our storytelling.
Premier Rodney MacDonald said there are many aspects of the province’s history that may be unsavoury but didn’t commit to making any changes.
"There’s value in reviewing what has been suggested, but I have not given it a great deal of thought beyond that," he said. ( jsimpson@herald.ca)
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Group wants Cornwallis name purged from public usage
By Our Staff
Thu. Aug 14 - 4:46 AM
There’s another move afoot to purge the name of Edward Cornwallis, the 18th-century colonial founder of Halifax, from public places.
In the past, critics of the English military man have called for the removal of his name from such sites as parks, schools and statues because of his attempts at genocide against the Mi’kmaq.
Mr. Cornwallis, a career soldier and administrator, was appointed governor of Nova Scotia in 1749. He died at Gibraltar in 1776.
An online petition promoted by a metro woman, Cheryl LeBlanc-Weldon, asks that governments yank the Cornwallis name out of the public domain.
The petition started last week and has more than 400 names.
Ms. LeBlanc-Weldon, a teacher from West Chezzetcook, said Wednesday she’s not an aboriginal person but believes honouring a man many consider a mass murderer is abhorrent. Her petition, prepared with the help of Halifax Mi’kmaq author Daniel Paul, says all Cornwallis sites should be renamed.
"We firmly believe that no person who attempted genocide should, under any circumstances, receive public honours," the petition says. "Morally, no nation that self-describes itself as civilized, can justify honouring such a man. His action demands that he be condemned by honourable, caring citizens."
Mr. Paul, who wrote a history book from the native perspective called We Were Not the Savages, used to write a column for The Chronicle Herald. He’s a longtime human rights activist who met Ms. LeBlanc-Weldon when she asked him to give a talk to her students.
Ms. LeBlanc-Weldon said once the petition has a substantial number of names, perhaps in the fall, she hopes to present it to Halifax regional council. Her goal is to persuade the city to take Cornwallis’s name off all municipal sites.
"We would like to have a bit more support — between 1,000 and 2,000 names — before we take it to council," Ms. LeBlanc-Weldon said.
She also plans to make a presentation to the school advisory council at Cornwallis Junior High in Halifax "to see if they would consider renaming their school."
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July 16, 2008
M. Francois Fillon
Premier ministre of France
Hotel Matignon
3, rue de Varenne
F-757oo Paris France
Mr. Prime Minister:
I have been informed, via a copy of a letter sent to you by Mi’kmaq Keptin John Joe Sark, that you made, during your July 2008 state visit to Quebec City, a very inappropriate statement when commenting about what Champlain encountered when he founded Quebec City in 1608: “the land was lawless .... the place was full of Indians.” If the allegation is true, it is a statement to which I take great exception. The following paragraph from Sark’s letter is where your alleged statement is quoted from.
“Monsieur le Premier ministre, given our relationship over the years, I was shocked to hear the words which were attributed to you by the translator as I watched the CBC News on Television on July 3, 2008. Of course, the translation which I heard was in English. The translator quoted you as saying: ‘the land was lawless, with thick woods and the place was full of Indians’".
First and foremost, this part of your statement “the place was full of Indians” implies that our ancestors were not human, but wild animals, or vermin such as lice. A more appropriate description of the residents should have been made in this manner: The place was full of People who differed greatly from the European concept of how people should act and live. Such a statement is also offensive to millions of non-First Nation Canadians, especially Acadiens and Québécois, who have some First Nation ancestry in their background.
Laws:
In regards to the seventeenth century civilizations of the first inhabitants of this land, our ancestors had well developed, mostly democratic cultures, the people ruled, not the aristocrat. Example: Opposite to the leadership requirements of the seventeenth century cultures of Europe, where the divine right to rule was the province of the aristocrat, Mi'kmaq culture held that a leader had to earn the right to lead. The standards were rigid for men who aspired to leadership. Aspirants had to be compassionate, honourable, intelligent, brave and wise.
The term of office was indeterminate, if a leader conducted himself well, his leadership could continue until death. A Mi'kmaq leader's social status was also sharply different from that of his European counterpart, who was paid handsomely, perked indiscriminately and widely feared. Chiefs and other office holders were not accorded special perks and privileges because of their positions. Those perks they did receive were freely given by the people as rewards for services rendered and as tokens of esteem.
Because of the nature of Mi'kmaq culture, political corruption was unknown. The European practice of using one's leadership to enhance personal and family fortunes by extracting favours from the community or its citizens would not have been tolerated. Any leader who engaged in such dishonourable practices would have soon found himself deposed and disgraced. The early Mi'kmaq had no taste for corruption and, given the principle of community ownership, there was no need for it.
Sieur de DiPreville wrote about leadership within Mi'kmaq society:
“The cherished hope of leadership inspires resolve to be adept in the chase. For it is by such aptitude a man obtains the highest place; here there is no inherited position due to birth or lineage, merit alone uplifts. He who has won exalted rank, which each himself hopes to attain, will never be deposed, except for some abhorrent crime. No wise noteworthy are the honours paid his high estate, for he is merely first among a hundred..., more, or less, according to the size of his domain”.
The laws of our civilizations demanded respect for the individual rights of the people, sharing and honor were two of the most important ingredients. Because of this, in sharp contrast to European cultures of the day, there were no people living in dire poverty while others prospered, all shared the same level of prosperity, individual greed was an unknown evil. Further, if not for sharing laws, which demanded that the People be hospitable to strangers, there would not have been a Quebec City. Upon arrival, if the People he encountered had not been so civilized, Champlain and company would have been slaughtered.
Calvin Martin commented about the generosity of the Mi’kmaq:
“Such generosity even extended to the abstract realm of ideas, theories, stories, news and teachings. The Native host prided himself on his ability to entertain and give assent to a variety of views, even if they were contrary to his better judgement. In this institutionalized hospitality lies the key to understanding the frustration of the Priest, whose sweet converts one day were the relapsed heathens of the next. Conversion was often more a superficial courtesy, rather than an eternal commitment, something the Jesuits could not fathom.”
Champlain, during his travels in North America, in contrast to the Europe of the day, did not find governments using terror tactics, such as hanging the bodies of people executed for committing what the state deemed to be political crimes, i.e., asking for human rights, hanging from trees, heads impaled on stakes, people tortured by burning at the stake, the rack etc. He found people who welcomed him and treated him with respect. Which I think should be reciprocated by the leaders of France today.
I hasten to say, that I do not attribute your statement, if true as alleged, to white supremacist views, but to genuine ignorance about our cultures, which ignorance is also widespread among the leadership of Canada as well. Thus, I would suggest, before making such statements in the future as “the land was lawless ....the place was full of Indians,” that you better inform yourself about First Nation Cultures. To learn more about North American First Nation Cultures, I invite you to visit my Website www.danielnpaul.com, also, please visit this URL http://www.danielnpaul.com/WeWereNotTheSavages-Mi'kmaqHistory.html to read excerpts from a First Nations history book I wrote, We Were Not the Savages. I think both will help to enlighten you immensely.
Although I believe that your statement was made without malicious aforethought, I do think an appropriate apology is in order, and that such would be most appreciated by First Nation Peoples throughout North America. Thanks for your attention.
All the best,
Dr. Daniel N. Paul, CM, ONS
Chair, Council on Mi’kmaq Education
28 Elmdale Crescent
Halifax, NS, Canada
B3R 2G5
********************
Dear Dr. Paul:
Please see below a letter I wrote to the Prime Minister of France.
Yours Sincerely,
John Joe Sark
July 15,2008
M.Francois Fillon, Premier ministre
Hotel Matignon
3, rue de Varenne
F-757oo Paris France
Monsieur le Premier ministre,
I am writing regarding your recent visit to Canada to participate in the400th anniversary celebrations of Québec City. As you may know, Samuel de Champlain chose this site, Kebek, meaning in Mi’kmaq, "where the river narrows", to establish a trading post where sixteen French settlers would survive the winter and establish the fur trade with the help of the Algonquin and Huron Wendat Nations.
The survival of the French in North America over the centuries was not by accident. The Mi'kmaq First Nation, of which I am an elder, and other First Nations helped to cure your early French settlers who came to our land from scurvy, taught them how to use snowshoes and canoes, dressed them in furs, fed them moose meat, etc. We also aided the French as military advisers and warriors in your colonial wars against the British; and we suffered greatly for that as the English placed bounties on our heads which were worth 50 pounds sterling a head. As well, the British killed many of us with blankets laced with smallpox which they gave to us as gifts.
Monsieur le Premier ministre, given our relationship over the years, I was shocked to hear the words which were attributed to you by the translator as I watched the CBC News on Television on July 3, 2008. Of course, the translation which I heard was in English. The translator quoted you as saying: "the land was lawless, with thick woods and the place was full of Indians".
Whoever wrote this speech for you doesn't seem to know much about our people. Our laws and etiquette were more humane and perhaps more sophisticated than some laws in a few European countries including France at the time.
Monsieur le Premier ministre, it is regrettable that you were not well briefed by your staff in regards to the rich cultural traditions of the Mi'kmaq and other First Nations People who had developed a long bond of peace and friendship with the French. This bond between our Peoples still exists to this day, and, despite the inappropriate remarks made by you at the Quebec 400th celebrations, I trust that this bond of peace and friendship between the French and First Nations People will continue for many generations to come. I believe that you should apologize to the Mi’kmaq people and to all First Nations in Canada for those inappropriate remarks.
Dr. John Joe Sark LLD (Hon.
Keptin of the Mi'kmaq Grand Council for the District of Epekwitk (PEI)
Johnston’s River
Charlottetown RR#5
Prince Edward Island
Canada
C1A 7J8
********************
Birchbark canoe thought to be among world's oldest returns to N.B.
First Nation leaders fighting to keep canoe in the country
June 5, 2008 | 11:02 AM AT
CBC News
Click Maliseet First Nation to view pictures
A First Nation (Maliseet) in New Brunswick is mounting a battle to keep a birchbark canoe from the 1800s in Canada, where it was made.
Widely known as "the grandfather canoe," it is believed to be among the oldest surviving birchbark canoes in the world.
"This is the oldest and one of the largest Maliseet cargo canoes I have ever seen," said Stephen Augustine, curator of Maritimes ethnology at the Canadian Museum of Civilization, in a release.
Augustine said the size and age of the canoe indicate the six-metre cargo canoe was likely used for transporting military, surveyors and furs up and down the St. John River.
According to the Canadian Museum of Civilization, the canoe appears to have been sold to British military Capt. Stepney St. George while he was working at a Canadian outpost, and he shipped the boat to his residence in Galway, Ireland.
When St. George died in 1847, the canoe was donated to the National University of Ireland in Galway.
Some First Nation members, however, are arguing that the canoe may have been taken from the colony and it should be returned to New Brunswick. No historic documentation has yet been found to either prove or disprove its sale.
Almost thrown away
After being displayed in a stairwell for decades, and collecting dust and insect damage, the canoe was almost thrown in the trash in 2001. But a professor saved it after recognizing its historical significance.
"It was an object that was part of the furniture. We didn't know anything about it," said Kathryn Moore, a geology professor at the Irish university.
The canoe is a precious and beautiful artifact with a remarkable history, Moore said.
"The canoe's past encompasses war, colonization, famine and heroism, and it is a wonderful symbol of military, migration and trade relations between Canada, Ireland and Britain," she said.
The canoe is made from birchbark and has cedar ribs, fastened by black spruce roots and sealed with pine resin.
There are also hand-sewn buoys along the canoe's length that are decorated with the flowers and fiddleheads, which are still used by Maliseet canoe-markers in New Brunswick.
The canoe was shipped to the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Ottawa in May 2007 for restoration and will now be displayed in the New Brunswick Museum in Saint John for a year.
"We're offering people this opportunity to connect with such a distinct part of New Brunswick's past," said Peter Laroque, curator at the museum.
It is scheduled then to be returned to Ireland.
But aboriginal groups say the canoe is theirs and should be returned to Canada.
Negotiating with Irish officials
"It's a rare and irreplaceable artifact," said Kim Brooks, a member of the St. Mary's First Nation, which is leading the charge to keep the canoe in the country.
"I think that Canada would at least try to support what we as the Maliseet Nation wish to see happen — to bring this grandfather canoe back to our people," Brooks said.
Maliseet leaders said on Wednesday they are currently negotiating with Irish officials to keep the canoe in New Brunswick.
"The canoe stands for who we are as Maliseet people, people of the river, and our connection with the river and that is what we are about," said Candice Paul, chief of the St. Mary's First Nation. "I think the canoe is a symbol of the people that we are."
Support from First Nations chiefs from across Canada is building to keep the canoe in New Brunswick, Paul said, and talks are occurring to help make it stay are happening.
The Assembly of First Nations also passed a motion in 2007 calling for the repatriation of the canoe.
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Colorado resolution compares Indians' deaths to Holocaust
By COLLEEN SLEVIN
The Associated Press
Wednesday, April 30, 2008; 6:08 PM
DENVER -- The Colorado Legislature passed a resolution Wednesday comparing the deaths of millions of American Indians to the Holocaust and other acts of genocide around the world.
The nonbinding measure passed 22-12 in the Senate and 59-4 in the House after some lawmakers protested that it unfairly condemned all Europeans for injustices against Indians.
The resolution says Europeans intentionally caused many American Indian deaths and that early American settlers often treated Indians with "cruelty and inhumanity."
It specifically mentions the forced removal of the Cherokee Nation in 1838 and the 1864 Sand Creek massacre in Colorado. It also refers to deaths due to disease that were intensified by forced migrations, food deprivation and enslavement by Europeans.
"Colleagues, this resolution is a recognition that up 120 million indigenous people have died as a result of European migration to what is now the United States of America," said sponsor Sen. Suzanne Williams, D-Aurora, a Comanche Indian.
Senate Minority Leader Andy McElhany, R-Colorado Springs, said the resolution painted all Europeans with a broad brush.
Sen. Paula Sandoval, D-Denver, said the resolution wasn't meant to blame all Europeans.
Members of a group of American Indians who came to the Capitol to watch the vote said they wanted recognition of what happened to their ancestors.
"It's nothing personal to the people of today but we have to recognize the past," said Theresa Gutierrez, who works with American Indian students at the University of Colorado in Denver.
A resolution formally apologizing to American Indians for centuries of government mistreatment was passed by the U.S. Senate in February but has not cleared the House.
www.1851Treaty.com
********************
Statement - 2-3036
DATE SET FOR INDIAN RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL APOLOGY
OTTAWA, ONTARIO (May 15, 2008) - The following statement was released today by the Honourable Chuck Strahl, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians, concerning the Federal Government's apology to former students of Indian Residential Schools:
"I am pleased and very proud to announce that the Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, on behalf of the Federal Government and all Canadians, will make a statement of apology to former students of Indian Residential Schools on June 11 in the House of Commons.
Thousands of former students and National Chief Phil Fontaine of the Assembly of First Nations, who is a former student of a residential school, have been calling for a formal apology from the Government of Canada for a number of years. Our Government shares their view that the apology is a crucial step in the journey towards healing and reconciliation.
With the Settlement Agreement and the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission, I am hopeful that the apology will help turn the page from the sad legacy of Indian Residential Schools and open a new chapter - one that is founded on renewed hope, faith, mutual respect and trust.
This will be a chapter that all Canadians can feel proud of."
For further information, contact:
Minister's Office
Josée Bellemare
Press Secretary
Office of the Honourable Chuck Strahl
819-997-0002
*********************
Paul inquiry closes with questions left
unanswered
A major missing piece of the puzzle into homeless man's death remains the testimony from B.C.'s Criminal Justice Branch
Gerry Bellett, Vancouver Sun
Published: Saturday, May 17, 2008
VANCOUVER - The Frank Paul Inquiry closed Friday facing the possibility that it might never get to examine all the circumstances surrounding Paul's death, which has become a cause celebre for anti-poverty and aboriginal groups concerned with the treatment of the homeless and addicted by the Vancouver police.
The major piece missing from the inquiry's work was the testimony of the Criminal Justice Branch, whose prosecutors refused to lay charges against the Vancouver police officers responsible for dealing with Paul the night he died.
Paul, a homeless, chronic alcoholic, died from exposure in an alley where police left him after being refused admission to jail following his arrest in a drunken, comatose state on the evening of Dec. 5, 1998.
Every other major agency -- the police, the coroners' service, the office of the B.C. Police Complaint Commissioner -- testified in detail concerning their parts in Paul's death or the aftermath when decisions were made not to allow any public inquiry into how Paul came to be in the alley and the police's part in it.
Inquiry Commissioner William Davies, a retired B.C. Supreme Court justice, ordered three former Crown counsels -- now judges -- to appear and testify as to why none of the officers responsible for Paul being placed in the alley was charged.
Davies said such testimony was necessary under his terms of reference.
He said the branch was "under a cloud" for its response to Paul's death and the trio's testimony was needed to clear the air.
But the branch argued that the Crown counsel's office had privilege and could not be asked to explain its decisions. The branch went to the B.C. Supreme Court for a judicial review of Davies's order, which will be heard May 26.
This could lead to a protracted legal battle, and in the meantime, Davies has said he will have to write an interim report.
If his ruling is upheld, Davies said he would reconvene the hearings.
But on Friday he took the opportunity to thank the 37 lawyers and the special interest groups who had participated in the inquiry, which began six months ago and heard 60 days of evidence from 68 witnesses.
"There was in my mind a sincere effort by all involved to get to the truth of how Frank Paul died," said Davies.
"I am confident I have got all the available evidence for this tragedy and should it be necessary to reconvene the inquiry, counsel will be notified," he said.
The two final submissions came from counsel representing former Vancouver police Sgt. Russell Sanderson and the former B.C. Police Complaint Commission commissioner Don Morrison -- the pair whose actions drew most criticism as the inquiry unfolded.
It was Sanderson who decided not to allow Paul into the jail and who decided he wasn't drunk, ordering an inexperienced constable, David Instant, to take him to Broadway and Maple and release him.
Sanderson's lawyer Kevin Woodall said Sanderson genuinely believed Paul wasn't drunk, that had no reason to be committed to jail, and would be able to manage once he was returned to where he lived.
However, Instant didn't carry out his orders and left Paul in the alley near the detox centre after taking advice from a senior constable who told him Paul was homeless.
Joseph Arvay, representing Morrison who resigned as police complaint commissioner due to criticism of how he handled the Frank Paul matter, said Morrison's decision not to call a public hearing into the police's role was done in "good faith and with proper regard to the public interest."
Morrison was B.C.'s first police complaint commissioner and his decision not to call an inquiry resulted in an internal revolt by his staff, who wanted a public hearing.
This discontent, along with continual demands from the aboriginal community for a public hearing, eventually led to the government setting up the inquiry.
gbellett@png.canwest.com
********************
The Canadian Press
May 10, 2008
"Shocking' case could help native cause"
By CAMILLE BAINS,
VANCOUVER — The president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs says the freezing death of an aboriginal man in a Vancouver alley has created an opportunity to examine systemic racism within police departments and the criminal justice system.
"The Frank Paul inquiry has opened many doors and created a shocking and growing awareness about systemic racism, about how people of colour, about how indigenous people are victimized and continue to be victimized by the system," Grand Chief Stewart Phillip said Friday at a public inquiry into Paul’s death.
He said the shocking evidence heard at the inquiry has captured the attention of First Nations across Canada.
Phillip also criticized the B.C. government for taking nine years to announce the inquiry that aboriginal groups and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association had doggedly fought for.
He said the province’s First Nations Leadership Council is outraged that the Criminal Justice Branch is going to court to prevent prosecutors from testifying at the inquiry about why two police officers connected to Paul’s death were never charged with any crime.
Paul was found dead of hypothermia in an alley on Dec. 6, 1998, after a police officer dumped him there.
The 48-year-old Mi’kmaq had been picked up for being drunk in a public place but was then refused admission to the city drunk tank. The sergeant on duty said he wasn’t intoxicated but only looked that way because of a disability.
A video recording presented at the inquiry showed Paul was dragged, soaking wet, in and out of the drunk tank because he couldn’t walk. Phillip said he and two other aboriginal leaders tried for years to get an inquiry into Paul’s death and that former police chief Jamie Graham told them it would never happen.
"We told him with great conviction that ‘Oh yes, there will be an inquiry into the death of Frank Paul,’ " Phillip said.
"Chief Graham actually made an attempt to convince us that we could have a charade, we could have a sham inquiry and he said, ‘You can have your little ceremonies and you can burn your sweet grass and it’ll just be like an inquiry.’ And we absolutely, unequivocally rejected that notion.
"At that point he looked across his desk at us and he said, ‘You do realize public inquiries are nasty, nasty things.’ And we said that’s exactly the point, that we need to have a public review of all of those decisions that were taken at all of those levels that contributed to Frank Paul’s death."
Paul’s cousin, Peggy Clement, of Elsipogtog, NB., reminded the inquiry Friday that local RCMP, on behalf of the Vancouver Police Department, told the family Paul died in a hit-and-run accident.
"For two years the family was under the impression he died by a hit-and-run driver," she said during her emotional testimony.
’Indigenous people are victimized and continue to be victimized by the system.’ Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, President, Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs
********************
The Santiago (Chile) Times
January 4, 2008
Mapuche: Clash with Police Result in Casualty
Ongoing animosity between Chilean authorities and Mapuche groups took a bloody turn Thursday morning [03 January 2008] when Carabineros police reportedly shot and killed a university student in Region IX.
At approximately 6 a.m. some 30 members of the Yupeco-Vilcun community attempted to occupy a farm located some 20 miles south-west of Temuco, the regional capital. There they were met by armed Carabineros, who fired on the activists, killing 22-year-old Universidad de la Frontera agronomy student Matías Valentín Catrileo Quezada.
According to journalist Elias Paillan of the Observatory for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (ODPI), the group – which entered the Santa Margartia farm to perform a “symbolic act of land recovery” – fled the scene carrying the deceased student’s body.
“The Mapuche group took the body and they protected it. They didn’t want to hand it over to the Carabineros because they didn’t feel there were any guarantees,” Paillan told the Santiago Times.
Despite demands by the government that they hand over the body, the protestors initially refused, calling instead for Church involvement. Eventually, Villarica Bishop Sixto Parzinger agreed to meet with the Mapuche group. After several hours of tense negotiations, the protestors finally gave up Catrileo’s body.
The human rights group Amnesty International (AI) demanded a full investigation into the incident.
“Throughout the course of the day we’ll be analyzing the circumstances,” said Ana Carolina Cofre, a coordinator with AI’s Indigenous People’s Human Rights Team. “We’ve already sent the information off to London and for now, there’s no official response… We can say that Amnesty International wants the rights of everyone involved in the incident to be guaranteed. We also demand a thorough investigation and expect the guilty parties to be brought to justice.”
This is certainly not the first time AI has turned its attention to the plight of Chile’s Mapuche people. In its most recent annual report, the influential human rights organization cited continued police abuse of Mapuches as one of the principal black marks on the country’s current human rights record. In July 2006, noted the report, Carabineros raided a Mapuche community in Malleco Province (Region IX) and then fired tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition on unarmed community members. As a pretext for the raid, police said they were in search of stolen animals. Six months later, police fired on Mapuche workers collecting their salaries in the city of Ercilla, also in Region IX. The attack injured six people, AI reported (ST, March 24, 2007).
“This is sad situation, but one that’s not really surprising given how the Mapuche social movement has been criminalized in recent years,” ODPI head José Aylwin told the Santiago Times. “One manifestation of that has been the legal persecution of Mapuche leaders involved in protests to recover their lands. The result has been the jailing of those leaders under (Augusto Pinochet-era) anti-terrorism laws, which have been questioned by human rights organizations.”
Coincidentally, both AI and ODPI first learned of the police killing during a joint press conference given Thursday morning [03 January 2008] in Santiago. Together the two groups met in AI’s Providencia office to report on an ongoing hunger strike initiated last October [2007] by Mapuche political prisoners in Region IX.
Four of the original five hunger strikers have had to give up their prolonged hunger strike. Héctor Llaitul ended his strike just this past Monday [31 December 2007]. During his 81-day fast Llaitul lost approximately 50 pounds. Patricia Troncoso, also known as “la Chepa,” is now the only remaining striker. Together the strikers are demanding the liberation of all Mapuche political prisoners.
“There’s a permanent police presence in some indigenous communities. There are daily raids and the indiscriminate use of fire arms to repress what yes, in some cases, can be violent protests. But in no way is that violence proportional with what the state employs,” said Aylwin
********************
Windspeaker
Declaration passes despite Canada's
dissenting vote
By Jorge Barrera - Windspeaker Writer - NEW YORK
October 2007 Issue
It was a moment more than two decades in the making and when it was over, the United Nations (UN) Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples was passed in the UN General Assembly with only four countries voting against formal adoption of the document-the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
The vote took place on Sept. 13 during the 61st UN general assembly. Adoption of the declaration passed with the support of 143 member countries. Eleven countries abstained from the vote.
"This marks a historic moment when United Nations member states and Indigenous peoples have reconciled with their painful histories and are resolved to move forward together on the path of human rights, justice and development for all," said UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, when the declaration passed.
Now that the declaration has been adopted, Canadian diplomats are allegedly working backroom channels to exempt the country from the protections the document grants to Indigenous people by pushing to dilute the mandate of the world body's point man on Indigenous issues.
Canadian representatives are trying to ensure the declaration casts no shadow over Canada by pushing to change an addition the mandate of the UN's special rapporteur on Indigenous peoples that would include promoting and implementing the declaration. Canada wants the mandate to exempt countries that did not support the text.
"Canada's position is that the declaration is not a legally binding instrument and it has no legal affect in Canada," said Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) spokesperson Patricia Valladao. "So we cannot support the change of the senior rapporteur's mandate."
The move has added salt to a wound left by Canada's decision to vote against the declaration.
"Many states feel that you don't generally get exempt from a non-binding declaration that is passed by the general assembly, but Canada is continuing to push to be exempt," Kenneth Deer, secretary for the Mohawk Nation in Kahnawake, said in a phone interview from Geneva where he was attending the UN Human Rights Council.
"Canada has dug itself into a hole and they don't want to be held accountable to anything in the declaration. They want the status-quo. They don't want to see things improve. They think Canada is perfect the way it is."
Canada's international reputation is no longer perfect, according to Indigenous leaders and human rights groups who leveled serious criticisms against the Stephen Harper government for changing Ottawa's position on the declaration.
"This is a stain on the country's international reputation," said Assembly of First Nations National Chief Phil Fontaine.
"We remain shocked and angered at Canada's refusal to support this important international human rights instrument," said Union of B.C. Chiefs Grand Chief Stewart Phillip. "It is truly ironic that four first world countries that have become prosperous through the exploitation of the lands and resources of the Indigenous peoples, including Canada, chose to oppose the adoption of the declaration."
Charges have also been leveled that Canada went beyond the efforts of other countries in its attempts to derail the declaration.
During a press conference a week before the final vote, the African Indigenous Caucus co-ordinator accused Canada of trying to turn African countries against the declaration in exchange for aid dollars.
"By approaching Africa, which had so many problems, and trying to use aid as a tool, Canada was committing a crime. Many poor countries did not have the ability to negotiate, because they were dependent on aid from developed countries," said Joseph Ole Simel, according to notes on the press conference posted on the UN Web site.
"Canada had tried to use any kind of 'sweet language' for the declaration to be blocked. However, the African countries ... refused to 'go the Canada way' and (took) independent position on the matter," he said.
"Indigenous people in Canada must be going through hell," said Ole Simel, during a press conference held after the declaration passed.
Foreign Affairs refused to respond to repeated requests for comment on the backroom bribery allegations and referred queries again to INAC.
Valladao said the allegations were "completely untrue."
According to internal government documents obtained by Amnesty International, Canada went against the advice of officials in Foreign Affairs, INAC and National Defence in its opposition to the declaration. But Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier and INAC Minister Chuck Strahl defended their government's vote against the declaration, claiming in a joint statement that the document, which sets out global human rights standards for the more than 370 million Indigenous people around the world, contravened Canada's Constitution and tipped the rights balance in favour of the Indigenous over the non-Indigenous.
"The current text ... is fundamentally flawed," said the ministers.
"We have stated publicly that we have significant concerns with the wording of provisions of the declaration such as those on: lands, territories and resources ... self-government without recognition of the importance of negotiations; intellectual property; military issues; and the need to achieve an appropriate balance between the rights and obligations of Indigenous peoples, member states and third parties."
As one of only four countries to vote against the UN declaration, Canada is in the minority, and it appears the group may soon grow even smaller. Australia's Labor Party, which is leading the polls in the run-up to an upcoming national election, has said they would sign on if they form the government.
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tierra_y_vida"
Let's Respect Our Mother EarthBy Evo Morales, 26 September, 2007
The following is a letter from President Evo Morales to the member representatives of the
United Nations on the issue of the environment.
Sister and brother Presidents and Heads of States of the United Nations:
The world is suffering from a fever due to climate change, and the
disease is the capitalist development model. Whilst over 10,000 years
the variation in carbon dioxide (CO2) levels on the planet was
approximately 10%, during the last 200 years of industrial development,
carbon emissions have increased by 30%. Since 1860, Europe and North
America have contributed 70% of the emissions of CO2. 2005 was the
hottest year in the last one thousand years on this planet.
Different investigations have demonstrated that out of the 40,170 living
species that have been studied, 16,119 are in danger of extinction. One
out of eight birds could disappear forever. One out of four mammals is
under threat. One out of every three reptiles could cease to exist.
Eight out of ten crustaceans and three out of four insects are at risk
of extinction. We are living through the sixth crisis of the extinction
of living species in the history of the planet and, on this occasion,
the rate of extinction is 100 times more accelerated than in geological
times.
Faced with this bleak future, transnational interests are proposing to
continue as before, and paint the machine green, which is to say,
continue with growth and irrational consumerism and inequality,
generating more and more profits, without realising that we are
currently consuming in one year what the planet produces in one year and
three months. Faced with this reality, the solution can not be an
environmental make over.
I read in the World Bank report that in order to mitigate the impacts of
climate change we need to end subsidies on hydrocarbons, put a price on
water and promote private investment in the clean energy sector. Once
again they want to apply market recipes and privatisation in order to
carry out business as usual, and with it, the same illnesses that these
policies produce. The same occurs in the case of biofuels, given that to
produce one litre of ethanol you require 12 litres of water. In the
same way, to process one ton of agrifuels you need, on average, one
hectare of land.
Faced with this situation, we are the indigenous peoples and humble and honest inhabitants of this planet and believe that the time has come to
put a stop to this, in order to rediscover our roots, with respect for
Mother Earth; with the Pachamama as we call it in the Andes.
Today, the indigenous peoples of Latin America and the world have been
called upon by history to convert ourselves into the vanguard of the
struggle to defend nature and life.
I am convinced that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples, recently approved after so many years of struggle,
needs to pass from paper to reality so that our knowledge and our
participation can help to construct a new future of hope for all. Who
else but the indigenous people, can point out the path for humanity in
order to preserve nature, natural resources and the territories that we
have inhabited from ancient times.
We need a profound change of direction, at the world wide level, so as
to stop being the condemned of the earth. The countries of the north
need to reduce their carbon emissions by between 60% and 80% if we want
to avoid a temperature rise of more than 2º in what is left of this
century, which would provoke global warming of catastrophic proportions
for life and nature.
We need to create a World Environment Organisation which is binding, and
which can discipline the World Trade Organisation, which is propelling
as towards barbarism. We can no longer continue to talk of growth in
Gross National Product without taking into consideration the destruction
and wastage of natural resources. We need to adopt an indicator that
allows us to consider, in a combined way, the Human Development Index
and the Ecological Footprint in order to measure our environmental
situation.
We need to apply harsh taxes on the super concentration of wealth, and
adopt effective mechanisms for its equitable redistribution. It is not
possible that three families can have an income superior to the combined
GDP of the 48 poorest countries. We can not talk of equity and social
justice whilst this situation continues.
The United States and Europe consume, on average, 8.4 times more that
the world average. It is necessary for them to reduce their level of
consumption and recognise that all of us are guests on this same land;
of the same Pachamama.
I know that change is not easy when an extremely powerful sector has to
renounce their extraordinary profits for the planet to survive. In my own country I suffer, with my head held high, this permanent sabotage
because we are ending privileges so that everyone can "Live Well" and
not better than our counterparts. I know that change in the world is
much more difficult than in my country, but I have absolute confidence
in human beings, in their capacity to reason, to learn from mistakes, to
recuperate their roots, and to change in order to forge a just, diverse,
inclusive, equilibrated world in harmony with nature.
Evo Morales Ayma
President of the Republic de Bolivia
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Halifax Herald - June 24, 2007 By BILL SPURR - Features Writer
At the Glooscap Heritage Centre outside Truro stands an empty display case awaiting the return of ceremonial clothing that left Nova Scotia more than 160 years ago.
In 1840, a Mi’kmaq chief named Louis-Benjamin Peminuit Paul in what is now Colchester County gave a gift to a captain in the British military.
That gift was his chief’s regalia, which consisted of a coat, leggings, moccasins, pouch, tobacco pipe and brooch.
"From what we know, he actually sold it," said David Christianson, manager of collections at the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History. "The Mi’kmaq often exchanged significant objects as a way of marking friendships; perhaps forming alliances isn’t too strong a term."
Capt. S. D. S. Huyghue, who had been serving in Nova Scotia, returned to Britain shortly after receiving the regalia, then moved to Australia, taking the Mi’kmaq clothing with him.
After his death, the regalia was donated to a museum, where it remains, though it has never been exhibited.
A decade ago, today’s Mi’kmaq community became aware of the existence of the regalia when someone stumbled over its description in the online listing of the collections of Museum Victoria in Melbourne.
"There was a couple from Millbrook that went down to Australia, saw the regalia and actually took a video of it," said Deborah Ginnish, co-ordinator at the Mi’kmaq Association for Cultural Studies.
"There’s cultural material out there throughout the world, not only Mi’kmaq, but any aboriginal First Nations. It’s spread all over. Especially when the English and French wars were going on, and ship’s captains were going back, some of them were given them as presents to take back to their own countries."
The jacket of the chief’s regalia is made of wool that would have been obtained through trade with the British and is adorned with silk ribbons and glass beads. The beads are so tiny there was no thread small enough and strong enough to sew them on the coat. So instead, individual hairs from a moose or mane of a horse were used.
"When you see the detail of the work done on the chief’s regalia — the jacket itself is quite amazing," said Ginnish, pointing out that there are people in the Mi’kmaq community today who still do that kind of beadwork.
Chief Paul was from the Sipekne’katik district, where the Millbrook and Indian Brook bands now exist. For that reason, when the existence of the regalia became known, it was suggested that those chiefs would decide where it would go if it came back to its original home.
"But at that time, we didn’t have a place to have the regalia brought back to," Ginnish said. "The chiefs wanted it to go back to a community that had a facility and had the proper storage. We weren’t ready for it, so that’s why we let it go."
Since then the Glooscap Heritage Centre has been built, including a special case for the regalia, which led to the resumption of negotiations to have the outfit repatriated. The plan is to ask the museum to loan it, then work on having it stay here permanently.
"That’s probably the quickest way we can get it here at this point," said Ginnish, adding the regalia would be very significant to Mi’kmaq living here now. The province’s Mi’kmaq community has enlisted the aid of the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History in negotiating with Museum Victoria for the repatriation of the regalia, which Christianson describes as historically significant.
"There’s very little Mi’kmaq clothing of any description that survives from that time," he said. "Secondly, the regalia is very well made and designed. It’s really an artistic achievement."
"From the point of view of Museum Victoria, they may feel more comfortable dealing with a museum of some standing and the Nova Scotia Museum is well over a hundred years old."
However, if the regalia is repatriated, it would be to the Mi’kmaq of Nova Scotia, not the museum. Christianson cautions against reading too much into the fact that Museum Victoria hasn’t yet agreed to send the regalia back to Canada.
"They own it," he said. "They own it legally, and as far as we know, they own it ethically. It’s not as if something was stolen. And the museum has not indicated that they will not repatriate. It’s just that it’s a significant cultural object and they want to be sure they if they do repatriate, it’s going to the right people and presumably there has to be some value to Museum Victoria."
Christianson speculated that before agreeing to repatriation, Museum Victoria might look for an exchange of materials and a relationship that could mean something like a Mi’kmaq cultural performance that takes place in Australia. He agreed with Ginnish that initially requesting a loan of the regalia, then continuing the repatriation process once it’s here has potential.
"It’s like a trial period," he said. "There’s a period of time when it’s cared for, it’s exhibited and it’s clear that it’s returned to the people that are most associated with it, and I suspect that may be one way forward here."
bspurr@herald.ca
Click Wood For All, Except The Mi'kmaq - GRAND CHIEF PORMINOUT: 1841 to read the Grand Chief's 1841 letter to Queen Victoria, in which he begs for mercy for our ancestors.
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VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict, who has been criticized by native peoples groups, said Wednesday the Roman Catholic Church does not gloss over the injustices that accompanied the Christian colonization of Latin America.
He said the church lamented that indigenous peoples’ basic rights were often trampled upon by missionaries.
"While we do not overlook the various injustices and sufferings which accompanied colonization, the Gospel has expressed and continues to express the identity of the peoples in this region and provides inspiration to address the challenges of our globalized era," Benedict told English-speaking pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square as he talked about his trip to Brazil earlier this month.
Benedict said that his visit to Brazil, his first papal voyage to Latin America, "embraced not only that great nation, but all Latin America, home to many of the world’s Catholics." He described the trip as being "above all, a pilgrimage of praise to God for the faith which has shaped their cultures for over 500 years."
"Certainly, the memory of a glorious past cannot ignore the shadows that accompanied the work of evangelizing the Latin American continent," he said.
Benedict’s remarks to Italian-speaking pilgrims at his general audience in the square were even stronger than the comments in English.
"It is not possible, indeed, to forget the sufferings and injustices inflicted by colonizers on the indigenous populations, whose fundamental human rights were often trampled on," Benedict said.
The pontiff said he was making a "dutiful mention of such unjustifiable crimes" and said some missionaries and theologians in the past had condemned them.
Native rights groups in Brazil criticized Benedict for his insistence that Latin American indigenous people wanted to become Christian before European conquerors arrived centuries ago.
During the trip, the pontiff told a regional conference of bishops in Brazil that pre-Columbian people of Latin America and the Caribbean were seeking Jesus Christ without realizing it.
Paulo Suess, an adviser to the church-backed Brazil’s Indian Missionary Council, said at the end of the trip that Benedict’s comments failed to take into account that native people were enslaved and killed by the Portuguese and Spanish settlers who forced them to become Catholic.
Marcio Meira, in charge of Brazil’s federal Indian Bureau, said indigenous people were forced to convert to Catholicism as the result of a "colonial process."
The Pope in Brazil told the bishops that, "the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture."
In 2000, during the Vatican’s Holy Year, the Catholic Church apologized to Brazil’s natives and blacks during a ceremony in Brazil for the "sins and errors" committed by its clergy and faithful in the past 500 years.
A Vatican cardinal representing Pope John Paul II participated in the ceremony, which saw the head of Brazil’s bishops conference ask God for forgiveness for the sins committed against brothers, especially indigenous people.
’It is not possible, indeed, to forget the sufferings and injustices inflicted by colonizers on the indigenous populations, whose fundamental human rights were often trampled on.’
Also Published in the Telegraph Journal (Saint John, New Brunswick) March 3, 2007
Canada: A Defender of Indigenous Rights?
Or Emperor with no Clothes?
March 1, 2007Professor Andrea Bear Nicholas, Chair in Native Studies, Saint Thomas University, Fredericton, New Brunswick
Personal Contribution
I have recently returned from visiting the Saami People in Norway at the invitation of Gáldu – the Resource Centre for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. I was amazed and inspired by the accomplishments of the Saami People and the work of the Gáldu Centre. Like First Nations in Canada, the Saamis have traditionally made their living off the land and waters, and like Aboriginal Peoples in Canada they have been exposed to enormous assimilatory pressures, including residential schools and an intense program of Norwegianization which nearly destroyed the Saamis as a distinct Indigenous People.
In spite of these intense pressures to assimilate, the Saami have, to a great extent, managed to maintain both their traditional forms of life and their languages. In 1980 they waged an unsuccessful protest against a giant dam construction project which ultimately flooded their land. They lost that struggle, but it politicized them like nothing else, and through organization, careful strategizing, and negotiation they have managed to wrest important concessions from the Norwegian Government, to the point where that government has ratified most international covenants on the rights of minorities and Indigenous Peoples. These include, among others, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the ILO Convention no. 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples. This last convention requires that states provide Indigenous Peoples with access to their lands and resources, and asserts that such access is central to the material and cultural survival of Indigenous Peoples as distinct peoples. While negotiations continue in Norway relative to fulfilling the requirements in the ILO Convention, Canada has not even ratified it.
It is largely because of Norway’s acceptance of obligations under this convention that the world of the Saamis is so drastically different from what First Nations experience in Canada. Norway’s acceptance of these international covenants allows the Saamis to live their traditional reindeer-herding, fishing, and hunting way of life without threat of arrest in those areas where their rights are recognized. As a result, the Saamis and the Norwegians do not have a history, as we do in Canada, of Oka or Ipperwash. Hardly a penny is spent by the Saamis in legal battles. They can direct their resources to more positive endeavors, such as research, organization, negotiation, and advocacy, even for the rights of Indigenous Peoples around the world, as does the Gáldu Resource Centre. Unfortunately since Canada refuses to recognize or comply with these same international covenants, First Nations in Canada must expend their limited resources in court battles. The recent Sappier and Polchies case is a prime example.
An important aspect of Saami revitalization has been the establishment of the Saami Parliament in 1989, which brought the largest group of Saami Peoples, those in Norway, together into one elected political unit to address all issues that affect Saami interests. This was made possible by a new section in the Norwegian Constitution adopted in 1988 which obligated “State authorities to create the conditions necessary for the Saamis to protect their language, culture, and society.”
As a result of Norway’s acceptance of various international conventions, Saami rights to language, including the right to publicly funded education in the medium of their language in Saami administrative areas, are now enshrined in law. To illustrate, how important language is to the Saami, the President of the Saami Parliament, who is quite a young woman, did not learn to speak her mother-tongue as a child, but she has learned it as an adult and now conducts the business of the Parliament in the language of her people. Language is a critical component of culture. Funds expended in court battles would be better directed and protecting and revitalizing Aboriginal languages.
Today only about 10% of the Saamis are occupied in reindeer herding, while most are engaged in other occupations including fishing, social services, and education. Many also pursue higher education. As a result, Saami intellectuals at the Saami University College, at the Nordic Saami Institute, and at other Saami studies centers in Norway, have been in the forefront of their revitalization movement. This vitality of a Saami intellectual tradition can be attributed, in large part, to the fact that as a people they are not all-absorbed by the struggle for basic rights, as we are in Canada.
What is most astonishing is how much the Saamis have accomplished without a huge population. By most accounts there are only about 70,000 Samis in all, and they are spread over the four countries of Russia, Finland, Sweden and Norway. The number of 40,000 Saamis in Norway alone is somewhat equivalent to the number of Mi’kmaq, Maliseet and Passamaquoddy people in Atlantic Canada.
Canada’s Non-compliance
Canada boasts a ranking as one of the best countries of the world in which to live. However, the reality for Indigenous Peoples here is quite the opposite. On the same scale we rank about 63rd, with North Korea. The horrific statistics for Indigenous Peoples in Canada relative to such measures as alcoholism, suicide, and incarceration rates are well-known to all, and need no repetition here.
Canada also claims to be a leader in the field of human rights around the world, but, like the emperor who wears no clothes, Canada’s human rights record where Indigenous Peoples are concerned, is dismal. Its operation of residential schools for nearly forty years after signing on to the UN Convention on Genocide in 1948 was a direct violation of that convention. Then last year it shamefully voted, together with the USA, Australia and New Zealand, to postpone the vote on the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, thereby ruining the chance that it will ever get through the UN General Assembly. (see, Indigenous Peoples Caucas for example, ) And it did so after pledging to uphold "the highest standards of human rights".
Its recent submission to The UN Committee on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination is a perfect example of the way in which Canada works to maintain its false image as a leader in human rights. Nowhere in Canada’s submission is there any assertion that Canada respects or complies with international conventions on Indigenous rights. And throughout Canada’s submission are repeated claims to the effect that Indigenous rights and title are fully recognized and affirmed in Canada. Paragraph 37, for example, asserts that “Since the mid-1970s Canada has adopted an approach of resolving through negotiations the assertion of continuing Aboriginal rights and title to lands that have not been dealt with by treaty or other means.” It is well known, in the Maritimes at least, that this is a misrepresentation of the truth since it has been the strategy of provincial governments here to charge our people for exercising such basic Aboriginal rights as simply cutting wood for our own needs on lands we never surrendered.
Indeed, provincial governments here have consistently chosen to litigate, rather then negotiate, matters of Aboriginal rights and title. They have appealed every court decision we have ever won, even after the Constitution Act of 1982 required Canadians to respect and honor Aboriginal and treaty, even after the full text of the Treaty of 1725-26 was found in 1983, and even after Maritime treaties were recognized as valid treaties by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1985.
One of the most poignant moments during my trip to Norway came after my presentation on this struggle when a reindeer herder in a small Saami village approached me to say he felt sorry for our people! In fact, people uniformly expressed great shock everywhere I spoke as they had been led to believe that Canada was such a great defender of Indigenous Rights.
The Need for Activism
Here in the Maritimes First Nations people have had to struggle continuously for recognition and respect for their rights, single practice by single practice. It has taken activism to accomplish that—the activism of continuing to live their way of life, and the activism of being charged, taken to court, and fined or imprisoned. It has required the activism of using their limited resources to cover the enormous costs of legal challenges. It has also required the activism of speaking out against the racism and oppression of being denied treaty and aboriginal rights. Activism is, and will continue to be, necessary until Canada, like Norway, begins to respect international standards on the rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Canadians need to be informed of their country’s failure to honor international covenants and they need to hold their elected officials accountable to this international embarrassment. Norway’s economy has not collapsed because of its recognition of its obligations to the Saami People. Indeed it is one of the top economies in the world. Canada should be honest to the world in its failure, and committed now to recognizing these obligations.
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Made in Nova Scotia: The right thing to do
Sunday March 11, 2007 Danny Graham
The agreement for a framework for aboriginal rights talks with the Mi’kmaq is the necessary first step in a long process, writes the province’s chief negotiator, Danny Graham
ON FEB. 23, at Membertou, the Mi’kmaq and the provincial and federal governments signed a framework agreement under the longterm process of negotiating Mi’kmaq rights and title, known as the Made- in- Nova Scotia Process.
Where did this agreement come from, and where is it leading?
For thousands of years, before the arrival of Europeans, there was a bustling and sophisticated aboriginal existence in what is now Nova Scotia. The Mi’kmaq were a practical people who creatively used the natural resources of the sea and the land to establish a livelihood for themselves.
They had a system of regional governance that stretched across the Maritimes and even had formal intergovernmental relations with neighbouring tribal groups in Quebec and Maine.
Everything changed with the arrival of settlers. Eventually, in an attempt to ensure their security and livelihood, the Mi’kmaq signed treaties with the British settlers in the 1700s. These treaties were ultimately ignored.
After centuries of debate about the significance of treaties, a rebalancing began when Canada’s highest court recognized the binding nature of Mi’kmaq treaties and began to interpret them in a modern context.
In 1999, the Supreme Court of Canada released a decision that recognized the treaties of 1760- 61 and reconfirmed the Mi’kmaq right to earn a moderate livelihood through fishing, hunting and gathering. In addition to treaty rights, the Supreme Court has also recognized Mi’kmaq aboriginal rights that pre- date the signing of treaties.
These decisions mean the federal and provincial governments must seriously address Mi’kmaq claims of rights and title. This is the right thing to do and now is the right time to do it.
A series of round tables, conducted by the Office of Aboriginal Affairs throughout the province last spring, found that many Nova Scotians want to participate in creating the conditions that will overcome the failures of the past.
For decades, governments and aboriginal groups across Canada have mainly used lawyers to determine the existence and scope of aboriginal rights and title. And, repeatedly, Canadian courts have told the parties to learn to work together, to negotiate, not litigate.
The Nova Scotia government has heeded this advice and is the first eastern province to establish a long- termprocess toward resolving issues of aboriginal rights and title.
It started with the signing of an overarching umbrella agreement in 2002. The signing of the framework agreement last month marks the completion of the next step in the process.
The framework agreement establishes what is on the table for discussions and how the parties will move through the issues. It is a roadmap of sorts to promote efficient, effective and timely negotiations.
The agenda for these negotiations relates generally to issues of natural resources, land and governance. For example, what management systems can be put in place for the Mi’kmaq to access timber for domestic purposes? This is an aboriginal right confirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada. The parties are developing a list of early priorities and longer- term goals.
There is much to do. Reaching agreement will not be easy. We expect to encounter many differences. Every side will need to be flexible and maintain the spirit of respect that has characterized discussions in the last few years.
Eleven of Nova Scotia’s 13 Mi’kmaq First Nations have signed the framework agreement — a large proportion by national standards — and we are hopeful that the remaining two First Nations will also join the process.
While negotiations continue, issues requiring immediate attention will arise. The Made- in- Nova Scotia Process needs to be responsive to current realities and not allow existing critical issues to fester. Already the process has demonstrated an ability to address immediate pressures on some natural resource issues.
For example, the parties have collaborated to improve the management of moose hunting in the Cape Breton Highlands. Although initial steps may be modest, they lay the foundation for more ambitious areas of co- operation in the future.
Finalizing a definitive accord will take many years. But by maintaining a spirit of good will, and by ensuring all Nova Scotians are informed about the process, we will, in due course, forge a new relationship with the Mi’kmaq.
We have experienced generations of strife that have left an unacceptable gap in the living standards between the Mi’kmaq and the rest of Nova Scotians. We can’t rewrite history, but we can start a new history together.
All Nova Scotians can benefit from a stronger, healthier Mi’kmaq population. Through negotiation we have a unique opportunity to do something positive by working with the First Nations communities to overcome issues that affect us all.
The signing of the framework agreement sets a solid foundation for building a better tomorrow and is a turning point in reconciling problems that have existed for centuries
Danny Graham is the chief negotiator for Nova Scotia in the Made- in- Nova Scotia Process.
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Winnipeg Free Press
White men get a taste of own medicine
Thursday - Aug 17 2006
Terrance Nelson
'SHRILL, ugly and lawless," says the editorial (Aug. 9), describing the situation in Caledonia, where the Mohawks now occupy the land.
As the chief of Roseau River, I say, "How does it feel, White Man, to have people who come to what you consider your property, set up their own system, refuse to go home, refuse to recognize your laws and then when you ask them to leave, they tell you that you no longer own the land?"
I say, bravo to the Mohawks, it is about time the white man got a taste of his own medicine.
Speaking of lawlessness, Delgamuukw, Haida, Marshall, Taku River, and many other Supreme Court decisions sided with the indigenous people, yet Canada ignores the very law you say must be upheld in Caledonia. So, is the law you speak of only good for the white guys, not for the Indians? Why did it only take 100 days for the white business people to get $12 million of compensation from Canada and yet the Indians are still waiting 200 years later?
You ask that First Nations be patient, to accept a process that National Chief Phil Fontaine stated averages 27 years to settle a land claim. For example, when CN Rail expropriated land belonging to the Birdtail Sioux reservation in 1905 for about $80 (without the consent of the real owners) the order-in-council removing the land from reserve status took only three days to complete. Our Treaty Land Entitlement purchases have not been converted, despite the fact that we have had a legally binding agreement with Canada since 1996. Our lands in 1903 that were similarly taken without our consent were converted to non-reservation status in 26 days with an order-in-council. So, when it benefits the white man, the law works fine.
In Delgamuukw, the Supreme Court of Canada recognized aboriginal title, but it also ruled that the original owners have no access to Canadian courts to apply for injunctive relief. So, the white man has protection against the law but not the Indian. The law you speak of, the injunctive relief, is only available to the whites, not the Indians.
Yeah, the law is great when it is on your side, White Man. Each of the provinces ensured that they have the notwithstanding clause, so they can ignore the law whenever it is not in their favour. Former Ontario premier David Peterson called Justice David Marshall's decision "bizarre."
It is a bizarre decision, because Superior Court Justice David Marshall would never be allowed to decide injunctive relief for the Indians. Did you see Marshall calling the police and government officials criminals for ignoring the law, did you see him asking to jail government officials? Of course not. Perhaps, the Indians would have a little less contempt for the law if it really was equal and available to everyone, not just the white guys.
I strongly support the Mohawks of Six Nations in their application of the indigenous notwithstanding clause to ignore this bizarre white man's decision.
In case you don't realize the consequences yet of seeing Mohawks on TV with bloodied faces, being beaten by OPP, I'll state this for you again. Hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars in resource wealth are travelling on thousands and thousands of kilometres of railway lines in this country. You whites did not bring these resources to our lands in your little boats; you left your God-given resources in Europe. If you didn't hear the anger at the Treaty 1-11 conference, where aboriginals met to discuss the original intent of Canada's numbered treaties, you don't realize the consequences of bloodying the faces of Mohawks. Right now, the government is negotiating without the economic consequences of railway blockades. Don't underestimate the consequences of killing unarmed Mohawks.
Terrance Nelson is chief of Roseau River First Nation
Winnipeg Free Press
Native blockades and threats aren't the solution
Friday Aug 18 2006
By Jim Prentice
I AM writing in response to an article published Aug. 17, 2006, ( by Chief Terrance Nelson of Roseau River First Nation.
Once again, the possibility of railway blockades was raised as a means of settling disputes. Let me state unequivocally that no one should resort to those kinds of threats to accomplish what Chief Nelson wishes to accomplish. I hope we can continue to work together in a manner that respects the laws of Canada and that does not harm third parties.
Before my election to Parliament, I had the honour of serving for 15 years on the Indian Claims Commission, and know first-hand the difficulties caused by the slow pace of the claims process. In fact, in a speech to the Annual General Meeting of the Association of First Nations in Vancouver, B.C. on July 13, I stated that the third pillar for strengthening the relationships between the government and the First Nations is to speed up the processes in place to settle claims.
I have met with Chief Nelson, as well as Grand Chief Ron Evans and five Dakota chiefs, among other notables, in my office in Calgary on July 4. We reached an understanding that I would address each chief's concerns in an appropriate manner.
Since then, concrete steps have been taken to address those concerns. Regrettably, everything cannot be done at once, but we are doing what is reasonably possible.
As you may have already learned, the Honourable W. H. (Bill) McKnight, former minister of Indian and Northern Affairs, has been appointed as the special representative to deal with certain First Nations issues in Manitoba. One of those issues concerns the claims of the five Manitoba Dakota First Nations regarding unextinguished aboriginal rights. Mr. McKnight will meet with the Manitoba Dakota to hear their perspective on aboriginal rights issues and to make recommendations to me. His vast experience in dealing with aboriginal issues will assist considerably in this effort.
Internal work on the advice provided to the Special Claims Directorate by the Department of Justice on the claims of the Saskatchewan Dakota and Lakota First Nations will continue during this period. No preliminary federal position on the claim will be taken until Mr. McKnight's work is completed.
Moreover, department officials are working with other chiefs to assess their claims. There are many areas in which the processes throughout Canada -- not just in Manitoba -- can be improved and the department has been instructed to address these issues with the aim of streamlining the process.
While threats of blockades generate headlines, they do nothing to assist in producing lasting, mutually beneficial solutions. The Harper government is committed to solving these problems, not by announcing grand, unachievable goals but by tackling them one step at a time. In the areas of education, housing and other quality-of-life issues, my department has:
* Addressed the legacy of residential schools; as a result, we approved the final Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement and immediately launched an advance payment program;
* Within weeks of taking office, we took action to improve the quality of drinking water on reserves; public consultations have been held in Winnipeg already;
* More recently, we took steps to address the fundamental human rights issues facing women and children on-reserve by undertaking consultations on matrimonial real property;
* Moreover, we also took steps to enable First Nations in British Columbia to assume meaningful control over on-reserve education, a model that I believe can be replicated throughout Canada.
In closing, I have been involved with First Nations issues in general -- and claims in particular -- for the larger part of my adult life.
I intend to meet with chiefs and First Nations when needed to resolve difficult issues in a climate of respect and determination.
Some past administrations have raised unreasonable expectations, only to disappoint First Nations over and over again.
We intend to set objectives that can be accomplished and show tangible, measurable results as quickly as possible.
Jim Prentice is minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, and federal interlocutor for Mtis and non-status Indians.
Comment by Mickey Posluns - August 18, 2006
The Minister could start by acting on the recommendations he made while
he was Chief Commissioner of the Indian Claims Commission. The
recommendations are still sitting on the Minister's desk. That is
something he could do today.
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May 30, 2006
The Times of London - Online
Romeo Luis Garcia, dictator General ran death squads in Guatemalan reign of terror
General Romeo Lucas Garcia was president of Guatemala during one of the most brutal passages of a 36-year civil war, in the course of which some 200,000 people, mainly Indian peasants, perished at the hands of the security forces.
He won a fraudulent election in 1978, with the votes of just over eight per cent of the electorate, and was eventually overthrown four years later by a brother officer, General Efrain Rios Montt, who was even more ruthless and single-minded. Rios Montt ordered what amounted to genocide against left-wing guerrillas and the Mayan Indians of the highlands of northern Guatemala, whom he suspected of helping them. Neither Lucas Garcia nor Rios Montt was ever brought to trial, and the latter remains an active politician. He may even be allowed to stand for president in next year’s elections.
The most notorious incident of Lucas Garcia’s presidency was in 1980, when Indian demonstrators and other opponents of his government occupied the Spanish Embassy in Guatemala City in an attempt to draw attention to their grievances. Lucas Garcia sent the police to evict them, fire broke out and 37 people died in the ensuing blaze. One of them was the father of Rigoberta Menchu, the Indian rights activist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992.
It was evidence produced by the Rigoberta Menchu Foundation that led, in 1999, to Spain’s highest court bringing charges of genocide, torture, kidnapping and murder against Lucas Garcia and five other senior Guatemalan army officers and civilian politicians. But by that time the retired general had been living in exile in Venezuela for a number of years, and attempts to extradite him failed. Since 1991 he had been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and was bedridden.
Fernando Romeo Lucas Garcia was born in San Juan Chamelco, in the department of Alta Verapaz, in 1924. He trained as an army officer, and rose quickly through the military hierarchy as a protege of General Carlos Arana Osorio, a right-wing ideologue who was President from 1970 to 1974, and continued to pull the strings behind the scenes for a number of years after that.
Arana was said to regard Lucas Garcia as rather dim and easily manipulated — which turned out to be not entirely the case. In 1978, after Lucas Garcia won the presidential election with the backing of the army’s own Democratic Institutional Party (PID), his security forces and the shadowy death squads associated with them, such as the Secret Anti-Communist Army (ESA), were unleashed with such ferocity that even Arana was disconcerted. The moderate civilian vice-president, Francisco Villagran Kramer, whose presence had given the regime a veneer of respectability, resigned in protest in 1981.
Two commissions of inquiry, set up after the peace accords of 1996, brought fighting to an end. Carefully documented evidence was prepared showing that Lucas Garcia, his Interior Minister Donaldo Alvarez Ruiz and the police chief German Chupina, were directly responsible for the "disappearance" or assassination of hundreds of opponents, including students, moderate centre-left politicians and human rights activists.
The commissions concluded that about 132,000 people died during the counter-insurgency sweeps and death squad operations mounted by the Lucas Garcia and Rios Montt regimes alone.
Bishop Juan Jose Gerardi, who drafted one of the reports, was murdered soon after it was published in 1998, in circumstances that have never been clarified — though three army officers and a priest were convicted by a Guatemalan court in 2001 of conspiring to kill the bishop.
Lucas Garcia’s supporters argue that he was responsible for a number of notable public works projects during his term, including the Chixoy hydroelectric scheme in his native Alta Verapaz (which involved the eviction of hundreds of Maya Indians from their land), the Pacific port of Puerto Quetzal and a road linking the capital with Antigua, a popular tourist destination.
The survivors of his regime regret that he never had to face his accusers in court.
Romeo Lucas Garcia is survived by his Venezuelan widow, Elsa Cirigliano, and their two daughters.
General Romeo Lucas Garcia, Guatemalan soldier and politician, was born on July 4, 1924. He died on May 27, 2006, aged 81.
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February Email from Poland
So, I live in Poznan, big city in western Poland.
In 1978 or little later two Polish anthropologist named Szklarskis wrote a trilogy "Black Hill's
Gold". It is completely history of Dakota Nation in 3 books. I don't know one boy here, who didn't read it :-) It is interesting, because Poles know almost nothing about Native Americans :-)
In 2004 died in Gdansk, Stanislaw Suplatowicz. His real name was Sat-Okh :-) He was famous writer here and real authority. His father was a Shawnee and mother Polish. He arrived to Poland with mother in 1934 or 1935. I don't know the reason, why they leaved USA.
In 1939 as You know Poland was attacked by Hitler and Stalin and Nazi terror began here. Sat-Okh was 16 and joined polish underground. He was arrested soon and many months kept and tortured in Gestapo's prison. Finally he was sent to death-camp in Auswitz (Oswiecim) as a person of "dirty race".
He escaped soon with the group of prisoners from train, but was injured. Almost death (one ball in face and second in leg) he was found by countrymen and covered deep in forest. He joined partisan troop and fought Germans in Holly Cross Mountains (south-eastern Poland). He took part in re-captured of prisoners in village Konskie, and two large battles with SS two days later.
One day SS burned alive about 100 men in one village suspected about partisans supporting. Sat-Okh's troop found the place of the crime and started to hunt them. After two days of running thru mountains Sat-Okh and his men got SS-men, surrounded them and killed all of them. He was promoted to lieutenant of polish army. He got 7 medals and crosses for braveness. Sat-Okh worked after war as a sailor. he spend on sea 40 years. In 1970s he met his sister and brother during travel to Canada. It was bitter meeting, he wrote. His father didn’t see him, his brother was like a stranger. Only with sister he had good relation. Canadian press wrote a little about "polish Indian". Both, sister and brother were murdered short after these publications. Perpetrators were never found.
I don’t remembers all facts but his biography is fascinating. He wrote many books. Every body loved him and he respected every man, he met. Specially children were his favorite guests :-) He had always time for them :-)
I found these books few months ago, started to read it again and felt like boy again :-) Im 31 and supposedly it's typical in this age :-)
Take care and best wishes :-)
Bartek
Quoted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sat Okh ("Long Feather"), born Stanistlaw Suptlatowicz April 15, 1920 in Canada Died July 3, 2003 in Gdansk) was a Polish soldier and writer.
He was born near the MacKenzie River to a Polish mother, and a Shawnee Indian. Shortly before World War II he travelled to Poland as Stanistlaw Suptlatowicz with his mother. In 1940 he was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, he escaped from the train and joined Armia Krajowa where he was known as “Kozak” (Cossack). During his underground military service he received Krzyzz Walecznych for bravery.
After the war in 1945 he was arrested and sentenced by the Polish Communist regime for belonging to Armia Krajowa. After being released he worked as a sailor and started writing books in Polish about his American Indian heritage.
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New York Times - June 11, 2005
Poor Little Rich Country
By WILLIAM POWERS
Samaipata, Bolivia
MY taxi is stuck behind Indian roadblocks. Three hundred farmers, many of them Quechua in colorful ponchos, just took control of the only highway near this small town in central Bolivia, right below a jaguar-shaped Inca temple. I can escape neither east to the sweltering boomtown of Santa Cruz nor west toward the windswept Andean capital, La Paz, where tens of thousands of Aymara Indians are on the march. I get through, but only after abandoning my taxi and making my way on foot.
For three weeks, the country has been paralyzed by blockades and protests; a few days after my experience at the roadblock, the uprising forced the president, Carlos Mesa, to resign. The protesters want to nationalize Bolivia's vast natural gas reserves, South America's second largest; BP has quintupled its estimate of Bolivia's proven reserves to 29 trillion cubic feet, worth a whopping $250 billion. The Indians are in a showdown with the International Monetary Fund and companies like British Gas, Repsol of Spain and Brazil's Petrobras that have already invested billions of dollars in exploration and extraction.
Many are calling the remarkable past five years in Bolivia a war against globalization. In a limited way, they're right. McDonald's closed its outlets here, unable to lure Bolivians away from their saice and salteñas. Demonstrators in bowler hats forced out Bechtel and Suez water privatizers; blocked an income tax urged by the mighty I.M.F.; and ousted President Mesa's predecessor, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozado, who spoke Spanish with a heavy American accent, over his plan to export Bolivian gas to California through Chile.
But this is not about walling off a Wal-Mart-free utopia; it's more of a struggle over who has power here. An American Indian majority is standing up to the light-skinned, European elite and its corruption-fueled relationships with the world.
You might say that Bolivia has colonized itself. When the Spanish Empire closed shop here in 1825, the Europeans who stayed on didn't seem to notice - and still don't. Even within Latin America, the region with the greatest wealth inequality in the world according to the World Bank, Bolivia is considered one of the most corrupt, per Transparency International's annual index of political dishonesty. It's also divided along a razor-sharp racial edge.
Highland and Amazon peoples compose almost two-thirds of Bolivia's population, the highest proportion of Indians in the hemisphere. (It's as if the United States had 160 million Apaches, Hopis and Iroquois.) And while native people are no longer forcibly sprayed with DDT for bugs and are today allowed into town squares, Bolivian apartheid - a "pigmentocracy of power" - continues.
I've been here for three years as an aid official, and exclusion is part of life. Indians are barred from swimming pools at some clubs, for example; they are still "peones" on eastern haciendas little touched by land reform. In La Paz, I was walking through the fashionable South Zone beside an Aymaran woman, Fátima, when another Bolivian viciously pushed her off the sidewalk. She wasn't shocked by the sentiment, but she was amazed that the man had been willing to touch her. Meanwhile, Bolivia's energy-rich eastern states are agitating for "autonomy" in a thinly disguised effort to deprive the poor Indian west of oil and gas revenues.
What is to be done to prevent a collapse in Bolivia? The answer, of course, must begin with Bolivians themselves. Elites here must recognize that the country's dark-skinned social movements are stronger than any political party or president and will not go away. Any lasting solution must shift real power to Bolivia's poor majority.
We'll see a lot of political maneuvering in the coming days. Some of the roadblocks have been dismantled in the wake of Mr. Mesa's ouster and the installation of a new interim president, Eduardo Rodríguez, the former head of the Supreme Court. But sustained stability depends on movement toward more equality, not just cosmetic changes, starting with speedy national elections and a constituent assembly with the full power to rewrite the Constitution and decide who benefits from Bolivia's petroleum.
Solving the crisis, however, depends not just on ending exclusion, but also on how the rest of the world relates to Bolivia, South America's poorest country, particularly through economic policy.
The United States and the international community have a vital role. In a speech this week, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was right to acknowledge Bolivia's democratic deficit.
But beyond lip service we must accept that democracy means, well, letting people decide what to do with their own resources. Existing contracts with foreign oil companies were signed by corrupt Bolivian leaders, without the approval of Congress. Even if nationalizing petroleum may be a growth-zapping bad idea, we need to let Bolivians themselves decide.
Moreover, our own ideas for this region are not always so fabulous. Bolivia was the testing ground for the I.M.F.'s "shock therapy" liberalization in 1985. This stringent recipe has made millions for oilmen and industrial soy farmers here (neither sector creates much employment) but has not reduced inequality; 20 years later, Bolivia's income levels are stagnant or worse, and half the population lives on less than $2 a day.
BESIDES taking a respectful hands off, the world should contribute one vital thing toward a more democratic society that embraces Indians: debt relief to the reforming government. Bolivia's debt load has risen to 82 percent of gross domestic product, sucking up a mind-boggling 40 percent of fiscal expenditures. This is a recipe for more poverty and turmoil.
Meanwhile, the Indians, distrusting Mr. Rodríguez's promise to call elections and talk to proponents of nationalization, are keeping some of the roadblocks in place, a tactic that costs millions of dollars in lost commerce, hurting the Indians themselves most of all. But as one Quechua told me as he crossed his arms in front of trucks here in Samaipata, vaguely evoking Tiananmen Square: "Our cultures have been blocked for 500 years. This is our only voice."
William Powers is the author of "Blue Clay People" and a forthcoming book on Bolivia, "A Natural Nation."
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/11/opinion/11powers.html?th&emc=th
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May 1, 2005
Extract from a speech delivered by Prime Minister Paul Martin to an International Firsheries Conference in St. John's, Newfoundland
On behalf of the government and indeed all Canadians — welcome to Canada, and to Newfoundland and Labrador, and to St. John’s. Many of you have traveled long distances to be here, and I know that at the end of this week, you’ll bring back part of this special province with you. The people here have a way of making visitors feel at home. And let me tell you from personal experience: once Newfoundland and Labrador is in your blood, it’s there to stay.
Canadians know this well. This province — known affectionately as “the Rock” — occupies a special place in our hearts, no matter where we’re from, no matter where we live in Canada. It also occupies a special place in our history.
It was here that Vikings first landed on North America’s shores, a thousand years ago. It was here that the start of North American history began to take shape. And it was here that Canada’s fishery began in earnest.
Five centuries ago — after Viking, Basque and Portuguese fishermen had laid the foundation of Canada’s fishery — the Italian explorer John Cabot took note of the fact that the waters of the so-called “new found land” were swarming with cod.
The fish were so plentiful, he said, that they could be taken from the water with baskets weighted down with stones. Cabot’s words made waves across the Atlantic. Fishermen from all over Europe made the yearly trek across the ocean to fish what they could in the summers before hauling their catch back to the bustling marketplaces of London, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon and beyond.
Canadian winters being what they are, it’s no surprise these fishermen headed home every autumn. But over time, many of them decided to stay – for a year, for two. The hardier ones stayed for life. They brought with them their culture, their customs, and their language. Today, many Newfoundland and Labrador towns bear the names given to them by these early settlers: Gambo. Port-aux-Choix. Portugal Cove. Spaniard’s Bay.
It’s no exaggeration to say that the story of the North America in many ways begins with the story of Newfoundland and Labrador. It was the promise of abundance, gifts from the sea, that brought so many people to Canada’s shores. That’s why it’s such a terrible irony that the poor state of the fishery today is what brings us to this conference.
The fishery arouses great passion in the hearts of Atlantic Canadians, as it does in hearts of any Canadian who lives near our three oceans. It’s bred in their bones. When times are hard for the fishery, they’re the first to feel the sting.... (cont.)
The Prime Minister’s Office - Communications
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Tuesday, December 7, 2004 The Halifax Herald Limited
GOULD, Roy Anslem
It is with great sadness we announce the passing of Roy Anslem Gould of Bradley Street, Membertou, Cape Breton, on Sunday, December 5, 2004.
Born in Sydney on February 4, 1946, he was a son of the late Virginia Gould (Membertou).
Roy had a varied and distinguished career as a journalist, publisher, host coordinator, facilitator, entrepreneur and elected official. Having begun his career in 1963 at St. Rita's Hospital, Sydney, Roy worked as a Development and Liaison Officer before being elected the youngest Chief in Canada in 1969 at the age of 23. Roy went on to be one of the original founders of the Union of Nova Scotia Indians in 1969. He went on to be the founder, publisher and Executive Director of the MicMac News and the Native Communications Society of Nova Scotia.
Besides operating his own restaurant, Roy's Place, he went on to serve his community of Membertou as elected councillor from 1991 to 1998, and again from 2002 until present. Roy also had been the coordinator of the annual Treaty Day celebrations in Halifax and past coordinator of the annual Wallace Bernard Memorial Youth Hockey Tournament. During his career, Roy also organized and opened the first Native Friendship Centre in Halifax in 1972 and from 1970-1974, produced and hosted the first Mikmaq Radio Show of Native issues for radio stations in Nova Scotia.
Appointed to the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission from 1969-1975, Roy later served on the School Board of Commissioners for the former City of Sydney. Roy also served on the organizing committee for the 1985 Papal Visit to Halifax and had also co-chaired the Nova Scotia Indian Summer Games. Serving on both the St. Ann's Mission Church and St. Anthony Daniel parish councils, Roy had also been an active member of the Membertou Seniors Committee and 4th Degree Knights of Columbus, Sydney.
Roy is survived by his son, Glen Gould, Vancouver; brothers, Clarence (Lorraine) and Duncan, both of Membertou; grandchildren, Na'Ku'set, Muin and Nepewisk Gould, and Aaron Francis, all of Vancouver; aunt, Margaret (MacDonald) Gould, Westmount; nephews, Clary and Adam, Membertou; Calvin Stevens, Eskasoni; nieces, Lee Marie and Tanya, Membertou; Elaine, Halifax; numerous Godchildren, extended family and friends too numerous to mention. Roy was predeceased by mother, Virginia Gould (Membertou); grandparents, Mary and Stephen Gould; uncles, Charlie and Frank Gould; nephew, Paul Gould (all of Membertou).
Visitation for the late Mr. Gould will take place at his residence, 52 Bradley St., Membertou, after 7 p.m. on Thursday, December 9, continuing until his service at 11 a.m. on Saturday, December 11, in St. Anthony Daniel Church, Rev. Paul McGillvray officiating. Interment in Resurrection Cemetery, Sydney Forks. After his interment, all are welcome to attend the Salite at Membertou Trade and Convention Centre, Membertou. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the St. Ann's Mission Church Fund or Membertou Seniors Club. On-line condolences to: twcurryparkviewchapel@ns.sympatico.ca
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FROM: THE NEW YORK TIMES NEWSPAPER
Chief's Retrial, 146 Years in the Making
By SARAH KERSHAW
Published: December 5, 2004
TACOMA, Wash., Dec. 3 - There are no living witnesses, and the defendant himself has been unavailable since 1858, when he was hanged before a crowd after being convicted of capital murder.
But 146 years later, the chief justice of the Washington State Supreme Court has convened what for this state may be the ultimate trial in absentia: a new day in court for Chief Leschi, a revered icon of the Nisqually Indians of Washington and a celebrated American Indian martyr who was convicted in the killing of a white militiaman in an 1855 war.
The trial, to begin here on Friday, should determine, after a century and a half of debate, whether Chief Leschi was wrongly put to death for killing A. B. Moses, a volunteer colonel, in what historians say was the first recorded case of capital punishment in Washington territory. The chief's descendents and some historians insist he did not kill the colonel.
"This really is uncharted territory," said the chief justice, Gerry L. Alexander, who convened the court after the State Legislature last March asked the court to reexamine Chief Leschi's case, following lobbying by descendants of the chief and others. "It's got real challenges and greater difficulty."
The judges will have to step back into the 19th century and make sense of a dusty historical record rife with gaps and unanswered questions and containing dense trial minutes scrawled by hand. The witnesses to be called are historians, military law experts and a few of the chief's 100 or so descendants. But the case will be tried by prosecutors and defense lawyers, including a county official here who supports the death penalty but is defending Chief Leschi.
"We can't even reconstruct this because nobody is living," said Justice Alexander, who declined to have the Supreme Court retry the case but created a special court instead. "The passage of time makes it extremely difficult to do this. But it is like a regular trial, because what you are doing at a trial is searching for the truth. So we're searching for it as best as we humanly can."
Such re-examinations of trials and other historical events are not unheard of, and re-enactments are common. They have ranged from bar association mock trials to official inquiries, addressing questions like whether Mrs. O'Leary's cow really did start the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 or whether John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln. They included a 2001 case here in which the State Supreme Court ruled that a Japanese-American law school graduate who was
denied entry to the state bar in 1902 should be posthumously admitted.
In the Leschi case, Washington's Historical Court of Inquiry and Justice, as the one-time court here has been christened, will have no legal authority to reverse the chief's murder conviction. But even if only symbolic, the findings of this court, comprised of seven active and recently retired Washington judges, may provide Chief Leschi's descendents with the exoneration they have long sought.
"We finally have a generation that's willing to listen clearly to the evidence," said Cynthia Iyall, a descendent of the chief and an economic development planner for the Nisqually Tribe, on a visit this week to his grave here.
If Chief Leschi (pronounced LESH-eye) is found not guilty, Ms. Iyall said some members of the Nisqually tribe of about 500 would try to update the many history books and other pieces of literature that mention him in Washington, where one tranquil lakeside Seattle neighborhood, Leschi, is named after him, along with schools and a waterfront park.
"At least we will be able to add a chapter or a paragraph to every story that is out there, a correct ending to every story, added in 2004," Ms. Iyall said.
The chief was hanged after two federal territorial court trials. After the first resulted in a deadlocked jury, he was convicted in the 1855 killing. The victim was a militiaman, and he was shot to death in an ambush on a prairie in western Washington in Indian-settler wars, according to historical accounts.
Questions were raised from the outset about whether Chief Leschi was even at the ambush, said Melissa Parr, a curator at the Washington State History Museum and member of the Committee to Exonerate Chief Leschi, which lobbied the Legislature for a re-examination of the case and an official apology to the tribe.
Even if the chief did kill the man, the descendents and some historians say that as a lawful combatant in war, Chief Leschi should never have been accused of murder. They also say that the second jury was not instructed to consider the laws of war, which could have exonerated him even if he had been found to have killed the militiaman.
And the chief's descendents, who live on a small reservation 30 miles south of here and who grew up hearing stories about him, said only a judicial exoneration, not a re-enactment of a trial or even a pardon from a governor or president, would bring the case to a close for them.
"I think he's watching from up above and he's clapping his hands and saying, 'Well, you finally did it,' " said Cecelia Svinth Carpenter, 80, a Nisqually Indian elder, historian and author, who wrote a biography of Chief Leschi, and with Ms. Iyall and Ms. Parr led a two-year effort to get the case reopened.
"My dream was always to clear his name. Even as a child I thought about it, that it was a necessary thing to do."
Chief Leschi's gravestone, on a hill in a small tribal cemetery here, has regular visitors, who have left necklaces, flowers and baskets of pine cones around the small granite monument. An inscription on the back of Chief Leschi's stone, written in 1929, says the chief was "judicially murdered Feb. 19, 1858, owing to misunderstanding."
Two prosecutors from the Pierce County Prosecuting Attorney's office who volunteered to argue in the new trial in support of the chief's conviction will try to prove that he was given his due process, including an appeal.
One of the prosecutors, Carl T. Hultman, said he once lived in the Leschi neighborhood in Seattle and was stunned later to discover that it was named after a convicted murder. Mr. Hultman said he was still preparing his arguments for the trial but that his basic approach was that cases have to end some time.
"We have a process that's supposed to allow for a fair ending, but it's also supposed to allow for the ending of conflicts, a finality," he said. "You don't just argue on forever about things."
But one of the lawyers defending Chief Leschi, John W. Ladenburg, the Pierce County executive who supports the death penalty, said he felt the case had long cried out for re-examination.
"We can't un-hang him," Mr. Ladenburg said. But, he added: "I think it is important to set the record straight in these kinds of cases. It will be a challenge to make it come alive for people, as if Leschi were there in the courtroom and we were arguing over his life."
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Friday, October 29, 2004 - The Halifax Herald Limited
Humanity's terrorist heritage still haunts us
By DANIEL N. PAUL
OVER THE EONS, billions of humans have perished at the hands of fanatical psychopaths, or nations controlled by them. History is filled with tales of their atrocities. It's my belief that this legacy is the root cause of the tragedy in Darfur, Sudan, and other horrors unravelling today.
Warring nations, to ease their consciences, use "collateral damage," a self-forgiving term, to describe the innocents they kill and maim after they bomb enemy cities. On the other hand, individual lunatics, or groups of them, deliberately target such innocents. But, after all is said and done, aren't the results the same?
For tens of centuries, many European nations were governed by murderous fanatics who, without conscience, inflicted horrific suffering on the populations of all habitable continents. Only in the last 50 years or so has their grip on power declined.
Unconscionably, with the exception of Nazi Germany's excesses and a few other horrific incidents, many of the horrors that these nations committed worldwide, although well documented, are not openly discussed. For instance, in their writings, they all but ignore the crimes against humanity that their ancestors committed during and after their forceful displacement of the Americas' indigenous peoples, while colonizing them with Europeans. This fact cannot be found in any school curriculum: By the time Europeans had finished their conquest of the Americas, the civilizations of two continents lay in ruins - tens of millions slaughtered, the worst genocide in human history!
In fairness, it must be said they did not restrict their terrorizing activities to other continents; they also vigorously carried them out in Europe. This desire to commit mayhem motivated them - while carrying out their wars, inquisitions, rebellions, impositions of radical political systems upon unwilling populations, and so on - to use evil genius to invent a multitude of horrendous instruments and methods to kill and torture people. During the 20th century alone, well over 100 million Europeans died from these activities.
Humanity has also, but not on the European scale, produced many evil monsters from nations of colour. For instance, Pol Pot, Idi Amin and Mao callously dispatched millions of souls.
Many motivating factors drive such perpetrators of horror; but greed, envy, racial and religious intolerance, thirst for domination, desire to impose alien political systems on others, and blind hate are at the forefront. I sometimes wonder if these vile sins are the values of modern civilization.
The desire to kill and terrorize hasn't abated much with the passage of time.
The destruction of New York's World Trade Center was one of the most spectacular planned acts of terror ever committed in peacetime. However, its horror pales in comparison to other not-so-spectacular recent acts of terror, ones that could have been prevented by the intervention of the so-called civilized world, or at least considerably mitigated.
For example, in Rwanda, several hundred thousand, perhaps a million, died terrifying deaths while "civilization" turned a blind eye. In Srebrenica, Bosnia, while mighty NATO's leaders wrung their hands and procrastinated, close to 8,000 men and boys were rounded up and executed.
Now, genocide is being committed in Darfur. Over 50,000 have been slaughtered by Sudanese government-backed militias, and a million displaced. As they are slaughtered and starved to death, the UN Security Council threatens sanctions against the country if it doesn't put a stop to it - sometime. Several hundred thousand children have been murdered during these horrors.
Incidentally, it's curious that the deaths of thousands of African children at the hands of terrorists doesn’t cause the same sort of outrage and condemnation that the deaths of a few hundred, or less, Europeans at the hands of terrorists cause in the West and in Russia. As repulsive as the idea might seem, is it because of skin colour? If not, then why is there not immediate action by the leaders of the powerful Western nations to put a stop to it when African children are slaughtered by the tens of thousands?
The child deaths that resulted from mindless terrorist acts in such places as Oklahoma City, U.S.A., and Beslan, Russia, were not preventable, because the fanatics involved struck without warning. In contrast, the deaths of most of the tens of thousands of African children slaughtered by terrorists were preventable because glaring warnings were there. They occurred because the Western nations, which have the wherewithal to prevent them, didn't; and indefensibly, they aren't stopping the ones occurring today.
There is a need to contain and destroy all terrorists, not just those who commit the most spectacular outrageous acts! If conscience were to prevail, defanging the terrorists in Darfur, Sudan, and ensuring the security of their victims should now be the world's No. 1 priority. The alternative is to add to the legacy of horror by permitting such atrocities to occur endlessly.
Daniel N. Paul is a human rights activist, historian and author
Email: daniel.paul@ns.sympatico.ca
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Friday, May 14, 2004 The Halifax Herald Limited
Unilateral schemes won't work for natives
By DANIEL N. PAUL
BEFORE discussing the ongoing problem of whites coming up with unilateral solutions for social problems that bedevil First Nation citizens, which has left the vast majority poverty stricken and marginalized, I'll identify what caused the problems in the first place: white supremacist solutions.
The truth of this is witnessed by the fact that almost every policy and program that the federal government's Indian Affairs branch developed and implemented since Confederation was done in hopes of achieving something that the UN has designated genocide - the deliberate destruction of indigenous cultures through assimilation.
Ironically, the white supremacist programs that bureaucrats developed to achieve it were the reason it never succeeded in Canada. For instance: In the 1800s, Indian reserves were set aside by Great Britain to get Indians out of sight and out of mind. On these often worthless tracts of land, the Brits started an education system solely designed to assimilate our peoples.
After Confederation, with the opening of Indian day and residential schools, the same goal was hotly pursued by Canada. In these institutions, children were forbidden to speak their languages and were taught that they were the product of "savage" cultures. To succeed, they had to adopt the white way.
As the decades passed, the bureaucrats and their political masters watched in consternation as their "enlightened efforts" resulted in failure after failure. These failures can be attributed to a few items they didn't take into consideration when fashioning their genocidal plans: the skin colour of the people they were trying to assimilate was red, which engendered in white Canadians racial discrimination towards them. And, our peoples, proud of their heritages, did not want to be assimilated.
Such assimilation shenanigans were still being played out when I was recruited by Indian Affairs in 1971. During my 15 years with it, racist, condescending paternalism and bureaucratic incompetence were so pronounced that it was shocking. In fact, it was so bad that a few conscientious white employees, when discussing it with me, often commented that some day I would write a book about it. I always reacted negatively toward such an idea.
However, in 1988, two years after leaving the Department, I changed my mind and began to write the 1993 edition of We Were Not the Savages - replaced in 2000 by a fully updated edition. In both editions, I chronicled the persecution that the Mi'kmaq and other First Nations peoples had suffered under British and Canadian rule. And, after Confederation, the incompetence of Indian Affairs bureaucrats who have, by mismanagement of the Crown's legal and moral responsibilities to First Nations peoples, put the country into very expensive legal jeopardy.
In fact, the whistle-blowing caused the publisher of the first edition to express some concern that we would be sued. I assured them that I couldn't envision the department opening up such a can of worms, which proved correct. Factually, which fully supports the content, the department has never once tried to dispute any of the revelations of incompetent mismanagement I made.
The new edition, in particular, chapters 12, 13, and 14, lay out the allegations in detail. This begs the question: why haven't the news media looked into the revelations of corruption and demanded answers? I'm inclined to believe that it wasn't done because the person making the allegations was an Indian. Thus, in keeping with systemic racist thought, not reliable. It can be reasonably assumed that if a white person had put the same allegations of horrendous government financial mismanagement practices into print as I did (i.e., by comparison the sponsorship program scandal is paltry) the fallout from it would still be settling.
That such attempts by First Nation peoples to educate Canadians about the failures of the past is falling on deaf ears is witnessed by this headline in the April 19 edition of the Calgary Herald: "Dump native reserve system - report" and this quote from it: "In a report called Apartheid: Canada's Ugly Secret, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation's Centre for Aboriginal Policy Change says reserve lands should be handed over to the aboriginals currently living on them.
"Tanis Fiss, the author of the report, says such a change would improve housing on reserves because there would be an incentive for residents to renovate and maintain the properties they inhabit."
I find it hard to believe that such simplistic solutions for complex First Nation social problems are still forthcoming from whites in 2004. I'll grant that Ms. Fiss and company believe that they are being compassionate and forward-looking. However, they haven't a clue as to why such solutions won't work.
First and foremost, the aforementioned is a white solution for problems that were created by whites when they implemented their past racist experiments. As the failures witness, it is not a viable course!
What you need to do to solve First Nation problems is to put them on the table for examination with us. Hopefully, by doing so, non-paternalistic solutions, endorsed by us, can be found. For it to work, this is the only way!
Incidentally, the $7.5-billion figure used in Fiss's report as the cost of supporting registered Indians is misleading. The vast majority of these funds are "entitlement funds," which would still be needed to support status Indians should Indian Affairs disappear tomorrow.
Daniel N. Paul is a human rights activist, historian and author.
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Tolerance.Org - February 19, 2004
Why Wasn't I Taught That?
EDITOR'S NOTE: In honor of Black History Month, Tolerance.Org offers a four-part series — "Why Wasn't I Taught That?" — with thumbnail biographies of African Americans whose names should be, but aren't, part of everyday school lessons.
Part III focuses on Ota Benga, an African man brought to the United States to be put on display at the St. Louis World's Fair, then housed in the monkey cages at the Bronx Zoo. Read about Benga and others housed in so-called "human zoos."
By Brian Willoughby | Senior Writer/Editor, Tolerance.Org
PART I
Feb. 19, 2004 -- A century ago, the Bronx Zoo monkey house included a gorilla named Dinah, an orangutan named Dohung and a caged African man named Ota Benga.
It remains a shocking display of man's inhumanity to man.
Ota Benga was first "displayed" at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis. Two years later, the African man became part of a zoo exhibit in New York.
Additional captured Africans were displayed with Ota Benga at the World's Fair, which offered "authentic" exhibits of other indigenous people of the world, including a Native American and a South American. These exhibits were described at the time as "permanent wildmen of the world, the races that had been left behind."
At the zoo, Ota Benga was the only human on display, housed with the gorilla, the orangutan, monkeys and chimpanzees.
Ota Benga was brought to America from the Belgian Congo in 1904 by African explorer Samuel Verner of South Carolina.
The story is retold to author Harvey Blume by Verner's grandson, Phillips Verner Bradford, in Ota Benga — The Pygmy at the Zoo (1992, St. Martin's Press).
A review by Library Journal calls it "a tragic glimpse at... human exploitation."
Kirkus Reviews calls it "an ugly instance of Western hubris."
And Ingram Library Services calls it an "astonishing and appalling story... in savage turn-of-the-century America. A fascinating glimpse at the... racism of America's past."
Explorer Verner and Ota Benga had what has been described by many as a friendship. After St. Louis, they returned to Central Africa together, traveling for 18 months, before returning to America. It was then that Ota Benga ended up in New York, first at a museum, then at the zoo.
Huge crowds visited the zoo — sometimes upwards of 40,000 people a day — where a sign promised, "The African Pygmy, Exhibited Each Afternoon." Sometimes, Ota Benga was allowed to wander the grounds, but he was returned nightly to his cage among the primates.
The grandson's book describes the scene: "Nearly every man, woman and child of (the) crowd made for the monkey house to see the star attraction in the park, the wild man from Africa. They chased him about the grounds all day, howling, jeering and yelling. Some of them poked him in the ribs, others tripped him up, all laughed at him."
Many Blacks, and the media, protested the treatment of Ota Benga. The African was eventually released from the zoo.
Though an adult at the time, the 4-foot-11, 103-pound Ota Benga was sent at first to an orphanage. Later, he lived in various seminaries and other religious institutions.
In 1916, despondent over the likelihood he would never return to Africa, Ota Benga shot himself to death. He was 35 years old.
Posthumously, Ota Benga has become a cause celebre for anti-evolution zealots who use the captured African as an example of the evils of the theory of evolution.
PART II
Saartjie Baartman and 'Human Zoos'
Across the Atlantic, and a century before Ota Benga, there was Saartjie Baartman.
In 1810, Baartman was brought from South Africa to Europe, first in London, then in Paris. In both places, she was called the "Hottentot Venus" and paraded before the public, often in the nude. Written accounts of the era described Baartman being "led by a keeper and exhibited like a wild beast, being obliged to walk, stand or sit as ordered." She also was "displayed" at society functions and other aristocratic gatherings.
Baartman's death, in 1815, gave her little reprieve from such treatment. Her skeleton was displayed at Muse de L'homme in Paris until 1976, when her bones were moved into a storage room. Only in 2002 were her remains returned to South Africa for proper burial.
A French foreign ministry spokesman at the time said, "This restitution signals France's willingness to render to Saartjie Baartman her dignity and arrange for her remains to rest in peace in South Africa."
Those words came nearly two centuries after Baartman was first put on public display.
PART III
Baartman and Benga were part of a larger movement, spanning 1870 through the early 1930s, of displaying so-called "exotic" people in Europe and, less often, America.
Consider this description from the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies:
Throughout Western Europe traveling exhibits of non-European natives were recurring features of zoological gardens where they eclipsed the drawing power of the more usual animal exhibits. Both exhibits were isolated by fences that variously protected sometimes the animals and more often the public; but in the cases of the human exhibits the main purpose of the fences seems to have been to stress the distinction between them and us.
The larger, and more sinister "fence," of course, was the inhumanity represented by such exhibits, which, in the words of the Montreal Institute, were designed to "provide conclusive evidence for the inherent superiority" of white Europeans.
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February 10, 2004 An opinion column about the Arlo Looking Cloud trial by Hazel Bonner, a freelance writer
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February 7, 2004
From: Catherine Martin: February 7, 2004
Press Release from Denise and Deborah Pictou Maloney
We,the Family of Anna Mae Pictou Aquash would like to acknowledge the
commitment and sacrifices made by those people in their efforts to
reveal the tragic truth in our mother's murder. Their persistence and
selfless efforts in their quest for justice have resulted in a guilty
verdict earlier today and will be forever acknowledged and honored by
our mother's family and the Mi'kmaq Nation. The news of a conviction
was bittersweet as we had just returned home from the trial in Rapid
City. We are hopeful and optimistic that this is the first step in
achieving justice for our mother and revealing the whole story
including those events that led up to her death.
M'sit Nokamaq,
Denise Maloney Pictou
Deborah Maloney Pictou
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February 3, 2004
Subject: Annie Mae on Sundance
The Spirit of Annie Mae is airing on the Sundance Channel in the US on March1.
Press Release:
March 1st at 9:00pm
The Spirit of Annie Mae (U.S. Television Premiere) - Directed by Catherine Anne Martin. The life and death of Native American activist Annie Mae Pictou-Aquash, who was murdered in 1975 on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. The 30-year-old Aquash was shot execution style, and for nearly three decades the crime remained officially unsolved.
A Nova Scotia-born Mi'kmaq, Aquash was one of the few highly placed women in the American Indian Movement (AIM), which in the 1970s took up arms to protest the U.S. government's treatment of Native Americans.
Martin, herself a Mi'kmaq, traces Annie Mae's path to activism as she interviews those who knew her best, including her sisters, her two daughters, her first husband, and fellow activists Buffy Saint-Marie and journalist Minnie Two-Shoes. The result is a film that is both an absorbing look at a turbulent era, and a moving portrait of an enormously brave and principled woman. The Spirit of Annie Mae premieres on March 1st at 9:00pm and also airs on the 8th at 5:00pm, the 16th at 4:45am, the 20th at 11:00am and the 26th at 7:30am and 2:00pm.
NOTE: In March 2003, a federal grand jury indicted Arlo Looking Cloud and John Graham on charges of first-degree murder in the Aquash case. Looking Cloud's trial is scheduled to begin on February 3, 2004.
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