New rebellion promised by Metis leader

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At the very least, Dwayne Roth will be in shape for the promised upcoming battles.

At the end of a 250-kilometre march from Saskatoon to Regina to challenge the provincial government's refusal to recognize the results of a controversial election that made Roth president of the Metis Nation-Saskatchewan (MNS), he declared the coming of a second Saskatchewan Metis rebellion.

Planned protests, he said, include occuption of lands Metis claim as their own, and disruption of official ceremonies planned for Saskatchewan's centennial celebrations.

"We will continue to fight. We are a nation of fighters," he said.

Roth launched his march Nov. 7 and ended it with a meeting with government officials, hoping to persuade the province to release funds for Metis people frozen since the election in May.

Roth was escorted into the city on Nov. 16, Louis Riel Day, by a small contingent of supporters on horseback, in cars and in campers and met a small group at the legislature gathered to commemorate the end of his trek.

Some picketed the building's front doors; others ate soup and bannock on the legislature steps while Roth saw Saskatchewan's deputy minister of First Nations and Metis Relations. Roth said the discussion was fruitless. "We talked with someone who had no ears," he said.

The new rebellion is a battle of wills between a provincial government hoping for another Metis organization to spring from the wreckage of the MNS, and Roth, who is seeking to unite, under his leadership, a badly divided Metis organziation.

"This is not about the money issue," Roth said. "This is about respect, our right of self determination."

But the money's no small thing.

After the MNS election, the provincial government suspended $410,000 of annual funding to the organization, withdrawing official recognition. The federal government halted its tri-partite funding in response.

Saskatchewan's former chief electoral officer, Keith Lampard, was commissioned to review the MNS election and issued a scathing report on it in November, citing dozens of irregularities that Lampard believes should put in doubt election results.

Roth said the provincial government has no choice but to accept the election results because the MNS senate ratified them.

"We're not going to stand for provincial government interference in our electoral process," he persisted.

Roth called for the resignation of First Nations and Metis Relations Minister Maynard Sonntag for his handling of the situation.

"The Saskatchewan government isn't dictating who should lead the MNS," Sonntag said, "but I have a responsibility as the minister who oversees $410,000 of taxpayers' money that it's administered properly. I also have a responsibility to the Metis people of Saskatchewan."

Roth said the money the province is withholding doesn't go to fund MNS core operations, but to youth, urban, women's and northern councils.

"It's really hurting Metis people at the grassroots level."

Roth said that 2005 will be a year of protest for the province's Metis people and no MNS election will be held until 2008.