Trust. Integrity. Reputation.
1999 Windspeaker November Headlines
November - 99
Thanksgiving spirit
Families and singles celebrated Thanksgiving dinner together at the Boyle Street Co-op, an inner city community centre in Edmonton. More than 800 people enjoyed mashed potatoes, gravy, turkey and all the trimmings while getting to visit with old friends and family members.
Photo Credit: Yvonne Irene Gladue
AFN pushes for inquiry into RCMP
Decision looms large
Alberta judge lays blame in teen suicide
Penitentiary holds workshops on health and healing
He risked his life to fight for our freedom
Dancers' enthusiasm heats up powwow
Racism: Federal policy - Guest Column
What's all the fuss about? - Editorial
The above is only a partial list of all the stories featured in the November, 1999 issue of Windspeaker.
If you are not receiving your own copy of Windspeaker, then you have missed out on a great deal of news, information and humour.
AFN pushes for inquiry into RCMP
By Paul Barnsley
Windspeaker Staff Writer
SAMSON CREE NATION, Alta.At almost the same moment that Grand Chief Phil Fontaine issued a statement at a press conference in the Yukon calling for a "contextual review" of the way the RCMP deals with Aboriginal people, an Assembly of First Nations staff member was echoing that call in Alberta.
Fontaine attended the inquiry into the death of Harley Clayton Timmers in Whitehorse. Timmers was shot to death by an RCMP officer on Sept. 8, 1998. After the inquest jury found that Timmers' death resulted because proper procedures weren't followed, Fontaine said on Oct. 8 that it's time for a close look at why Native people often end up dead when they deal with police officers.
"I've been calling for such a review for more than a year," he said. "Police force always seems to be lethal force when dealing with First Nations. The Solicitor General of Canada must meet with First Nations to determine the scope, mandate and terms for such a contextual review and this has to be done immediately. The federal government must not allow another life to be lost in such tragic circumstances. We have already lost too many lives."
Fontaine also said he plans to ask the solicitor general for a meeting to explore this idea.
On the same day, at the Jimmy Omeasoo Community Centre on the Samson Cree Nation territory in Alberta, Kathleen Mahoney was representing Fontaine at a press conference called by the family of the late Wilson Nepoose. Nepoose, a Samson Cree Nation member, served five years in prison for murder before he was freed after an Alberta appellate court judge called his conviction a "miscarriage of justice." Nepoose was later found dead in an apparent suicide that his family believes was caused by the trauma of his ill-fated encounter with the Canadian justice system. The family is going ahead with a lawsuit against the arresting officer, the prosecutor and both the provincial and federal governments.
Mahoney said that while the AFN supports the family's struggle for justice, the national First Nations organization is looking at the bigger picture.
"Why do these cases keep happening?" she said. "We have presently going on in Calgary the Jacobs inquiry, the Yukon inquiry just finished and there's other issues on the forefront about to emerge. The AFN is very concerned in seeing the linkages between all of these cases. The linkages appear to be a discriminatory attitude towards First Nations citizens, be they witnesses, be they accused of crimes or civil matters, and the way in which they're treated within the justice system.
That's the issue the AFN is concerned about and they want to get to the bottom of it. They want to have government look at it not on a case-by-case basis where inquiry reports are written up and put on a shelf to gather dust. They want see a nation-wide inquiry into the whole relationship with the RCMP to First Nations peoples."
The number of similar cases has reached the point where they can't be written off as coincidence, Mahoney said, adding that all Canadians should have an interest in examining the issue.
"What our national police force does in the name of Canadians, it does so in the name of all of us, and certainly if some members of our society are not getting justice, it should be a matter of concern for all members of society. So, certainly this is not just a First Nations issue, this is a pan-Canadian issue," she said.
Donald Marshall, Jr., a Mi'kmaq man who served 11 years in prison for a crime of which he was later proved innocent, also attended the Alberta press conference to lend his support to the family.
"The Nepoose family invited me down here not only to support their cause but to talk to their young people about justice amongst Native people. To me, Native people are targets in our justice system and I think we have to be educated and learn that the court system does not work for the Native people," he said. "I believe that Wilson Nepoose's story has been there for the last 13 years and that's a long time. I believe it should be dealt with immediately."
A number of influential people in Alberta have joined the family in pressing the provincial government to call an inquiry into the police investigation and criminal prosecution that sent Nepoose to prison. So far, they claim, they've been stonewalled.
"There must be something wrong in the government, the RCMP and the courts if they don't want to deal with it and it makes you wonder who's on the wrong side," Marshall said. "I think this family is ready to deal with it and the courts will have to deal with it."
Lester Nepoose, Wilson's brother, said six years have passed since a petition was presented to Alberta Premier Ralph Klein that called for an inquiry into the matter.
"What happened to my brother took the spirit away from my brother and damaged him a lot. We met with our leaders today and the support is there and the lawyers have said they are moving ahead with it - and it's not going to stop here - so that the Native people, the uneducated people, will know that we will be there for them too if they are victims in a situation like this," he said. "Ralph Klein claims to be a friend of First Nation people. I would like to ask him what happened? Back in 1993 we gave him 7,500 names and we haven't received a call. The people who signed that petition, I'm pretty sure they'd like to know what happened. Why has there been a miscarriage of justice?"
Bob Sachs, an Edmonton lawyer who has taken an interest in the Nepoose case, said it has the potential to break down the obstacles to accountability that authorities construct when mistakes are made.
"The most significant aspect of the case is that it is, depending on your perspective, one of the worst or one of the best examples of how an injustice can happen to a Native Canadian and it just sort of slides away," he said.
"That's why it's so encouraging for the Nepoose family to have Donald Marshall here today to lend his support, for the Samson Cree Nation to come forward and indicate that they will do what they can to support the continuing efforts of the Nepoose family to clear their name, why Kathleen Mahoney is here today on behalf of the AFN to lend their support to the continuing struggle to right the injustice.
"This whole case is an embarrassment to the Alberta government, to the RCMP and to the federal government for that matter. You have to recall that the court of appeal called this a miscarriage of justice. I can't frankly understand why the federal government and the Alberta government aren't knocking on the Nepoose family door with an apology and an offer to help them in any way they can."
Instead, the lawyer said, government officials have abused their powers and privileges to protect themselves from bearing the responsibility of their mistakes.
"The defendants, being the federal government and the provincial government, have put up every roadblock possible to stall and delay this particular lawsuit. It becomes increasingly more difficult as time goes by for the family to continue a fight where they're continually stonewalled by government," he said.
Jack Ramsay, a Reform Party MP and a former RCMP officer, also attended the Alberta press conference. He has been involved in the case almost from the beginning and said he has taken a special interest in seeing the truth come out.
"I was involved in the case before I was elected and I know from the evidence . . . I'm one of the few people who has looked at the evidence from front to end and I know that Wilson Nepoose was not guilty of the murder he was convicted of and I know that he spent five years in jail for a crime he didn't commit. And in as much as I have possession of that knowledge, I will lend my support to any effort that will clear the air on this and allow the family to bring closure to the issue," he said.
"I can stand as a witness in my caucus and in the House and state as I have stated here today, and many other times, of my complete conviction and absolute understanding that Wilson Nepoose was innocent of the crime that he was convicted of and if the evidence that I looked at was placed before the Canadian people I think the vast majority, if not all, would admit that. Wilson Nepoose was granted a new trial, but the Crown of this province chose not to re-try him so that that evidence could be placed before the people and have his name cleared and that was not allowed."
Sachs stated bluntly that the only thing preventing the truth from coming out is political stonewalling.
"If there were to be at some juncture the political will to set this right, to see justice finally done in this case, I'm sure it could be done like that," he said. "If you were to ask Mr. [David] Hancock, who is the attorney general of Alberta, and Ms. [Anne] MacLellan, the federal justice minister, to actually take a personal look at this, I think Jack and I and Lester could convince each of them that there's no way in the world that this man should ever have been charged, tried or convicted, and that, in the end result, he did not do this."
Ramsay added that the request for an inquiry was rejected on the grounds that the RCMP was going to conduct an internal investigation into the matter. When the federal police force investigated itself, it found its actions were acceptable.
Sachs isn't working on the case, but he said he's been in contact with the lawyers who are doing so. He said the claim by the RCMP and the government that the investigation was conducted properly can be easily negated by the facts.
"Lawyers for the family indicate to me that they're confident they can prove otherwise, that there was gross ineptitude and one could almost go as far as to say that there was a cover-up and that Wilson Nepoose was railroaded," he said. "There is a systemic, discriminatory attitude both in the RCMP and I would venture to guess within the attorney general's department of Alberta. Because of that, because I hear statements like, 'It's just another Indian murder. We don't have to go the extra mile to try to bring those who are responsible to justice.' When you hear things like that there is a systemic discrimination within those institutions and so that is what the AFN is trying to get at."
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Decision looms largeBy Paul Barnsley
Windspeaker Staff Writer
BURNT CHURCH, N.B.An uneasy calm has settled over the New Brunswick reserve where an incident that has been described by some observers as a race riot pitted Native people against non-Native people and resulted in police laying charges against a number of area residents.
Non-Native fishermen staged a protest in the waters just off the Burnt Church wharf on Oct. 3. They were angry that Native fishermen were exercising the right, recognized two weeks before by the Supreme Court of Canada's Marshall decision, to fish without a license. The protesters then cut the lines on Native lobster traps, sparking an angry reaction from several young Native men. Violence erupted, which resulted in the hospitalization of one Native man.
On Oct. 18, there was little activity back on the reserve, located some 40 km east of the Miramichi Provincial Court where five Burnt Church First Nation members appeared, formally charged with breaking and entering a garage owned by a non-Native fisherman who they suspected had stolen fishing equipment owned by band members. One other Native man facing charges was unable to appear in court because he remains in hospital after suffering serious injuries during the Oct. 3 altercation.
The Burnt Church members appeared in court for the 9:30 a.m. session, which ended before 11 a.m. In what court officials said was a deliberate move, the 20 non-Native people facing a variety of charges related to the Oct. 3 violence were not scheduled to appear in court to go through the identical formal charging process until the 1:30 p.m. session. The groups of accused were kept separate to prevent further confrontation.
One non-Native man faces charges of assault with a vehicle and assault with a baseball bat. He and 15 others have been charged with cutting Native lobster traps. Two of those were charged with resisting arrest. Those 16 and four others also face charges of fishing out of season.
Local RCMP officers waited long enough to file the charges to prompt Canadian Race Relations Foundation executive director, Moy Tam, to worry that no charges would be laid. Tam felt the need to issue a statement urging the RCMP to lay the charges.
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Judge Andrew Stymiest gave all the accused until Nov. 1 to obtain legal counsel and enter pleas.
As chiefs and government officials met under the close scrutiny of the media in Ottawa in an attempt to bang out an agreement that will defuse the tension related to a Supreme Court decision and to prevent further outbreaks of violence, newly elected Burnt Church Chief Wilbur Dedam stayed home to get up to speed on local issues and to be ready to respond should the conflict renew itself. A representative of the Mawiw Council, a group made up of the three largest bands in the province, represented Burnt Church at the Ottawa talks.
Dedam was chief of his band for 18 years before losing an election three years ago. He regained the position last summer and was sworn in as chief on Aug. 13, just barely in time to have this political hot potato dropped into his lap. In a region where fishing is by far the biggest industry, one from which Native people have long been excluded, the veteran politician sees little that's new about the recent conflict.
"When we won with the Sparrow case, it was the same thing. We didn't have too many traps out there. We were allowed to put out something like . . . I think we started out with 2,000 traps, I guess, but we didn't have traps. We only had five [hundred] something. And then they destroyed all our traps and I took it back to the council and the council bought 500 traps. So the people that lost them, we gave five here, 10 there," he told Windspeaker. "We're always losing traps and nobody's saying nothing about it. Every year, we lose around two or three hundred traps."
The band's welfare department advances recipients several payments in advance so they can buy traps and attempt to create employment for themselves, the chief said.
"They'll usually take four or five cheques ahead of time to buy traps," he said. "So when somebody goes out there and cuts all their traps, it's really frustrating. They're trying to get off of this welfare and make a living by fishing."
Dedam said the local authorities - RCMP, provincial Natural Resources ministry officials and federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) officers - took no action when informed of the assault on his people's legal fishing activities.
"Nothing's being done about it. Every time we go to the DFO they usually tell you, 'We don't have the manpower here.' One of the members there said, 'We're only allowed to work eight hours a day, then we're out of the water.' Well, you should just come down there. You'd see a lot of poachers. They're setting their own traps. They fish their own traps. And they get away with it! Nobody's talking about it. But they talk about us when we go out there with 500 traps. That's only just a license and a half," he said.
The chief and Native fishermen claim that non-Native fishermen regularly cut the buoys that mark the location of their traps. This means the traps are lost. It costs about $100 for each trap, including the cost of the buoy and line. Mi'kmaq fisherman Mark Simon said the RCMP and the DFO aren't exactly zealous about investigating these incidents.
"You have to pretty well take pictures of them right there and then," he said. "But if it was us going out there, we'd be in jail right now."
The chief said there are about 1,200 members of his band but only about 60 of those members fish. He said his band members currently own a total of 580 lobster traps.
So far, there has not been any visible surge in the economy of Dedam's community: no signs offering lobster for sale are visible in the central area of the reserve.
The Supreme Court of Canada, in rendering the Marshall decision which prompted Native fishermen to take to the water to the dismay of commercial fishermen throughout the Maritime provinces, said First Nations people who are party to the treaty of 1760 have the right to engage in commercial activity to provide for a modest income. The law says his people have the right but the chief said they don't yet have the capacity to fully exercise it. He'd like to see his people begin to develop the local economy by doing so.
"Oh, I sure hope so," he said. "That would be my dream. On our reserve there's unemployment of 90 per cent."
Simon said there has been a slight improvement in the people's economic fortunes.
"The people at the garage, they notice it, the people at the stores. There's more money coming in. People are happy," he said.
But the lobster fishery won't make much difference this year, the chief said, since the prime fishing season is coming to an end as winter approaches.
"We'll probably stop fishing by the end of October," he said. "Usually we don't fish this long, but it's just to prove something. We don't want to be pushed out of the way."
When Fisheries minister Herb Dhaliwal tried to impose a 600-trap limit on the Burnt Church community, the people were motivated to keep fishing for two reasons, Dedam said. One, they felt they had to demonstrate to the government that it didn't have the right to create regulations that limited - if they didn't negate - the band's constitutionally recognized right to fish. Two, they felt the number was ridiculously low, considering individual commercial fishermen get 300 traps each.
"That 600 traps, that's an embarrassment. That's a slap in the face. The minister should just wake up. There's 1,200 people. What do you want them to do? Fight over the traps? He screwed it up," he said.
Dedam doesn't have the information or the resources to compile statistics about the various fisheries in the Maritime region, but he said he's heard government sources say that Aboriginal fishermen account for less than one per cent of the fishery.
Yet, there have been front page banner headlines in just about every daily newspaper in the country almost every day since the court decision was handed down. Frequently, the front page stories are accompanied by several other stories. If all of that is in response to less than one per cent of the activity within the fisheries, what's really going on, the chief wonders.
"It's racism, I guess," he said.
Since fishing is the major industry in the region and commercial fishing has traditionally been controlled by non-Native people (mainly because of the forced division of the races mandated by the Indian Act) any attempt by Native people to force their way into the fishery immediately creates divisions along racial lines, the chief said.
Most non-Native families have at least one relative who's in the fishing business, so it really becomes an 'us versus them' situation.
He said the fishermen's unions pressure the DFO who in turn pressure the First Nations. Dedam also claimed that the unions are organizing boycotts of markets that purchase from Native fishermen.
"They're boycotting all these markets so nobody wants to buy. They're scared," he said.
Individual fishermen have also taken action to intimidate local market owners, Simon said.
'The markets that were buying from us, they went and broke in and vandalized them. They threatened them. It's like logging. They stopped buying our wood," he said.
Ever since the non-Native fishermen staged the Oct. 3 protest that got out of control and resulted in the violence which led to the criminal charges, Mi'kmaq warriors have occupied the entrance to the Burnt Church wharf, watching over the boats tied up there. As tribal leaders and chiefs of provincial organizations talk to the federal government about wide-sweeping political solutions in Moncton and Ottawa, Dedam looks after the local situation, checking with Elders and the warriors and fishermen on regular basis.
He was scheduled to meet with the mayor of Miramichi on Oct. 20, after Windspeaker's publication deadline, and said he hoped they could find a starting point to mend the rift between the races in the region.
But the fact that he hasn't dashed off to Ottawa doesn't mean that Dedam isn't interested in hearing from Indian Affairs Minister Robert Nault. In fact, he can't figure out why Nault hasn't been to Burnt Church, the site of the worst, most violent anti-Native demonstration in recent years.
"When does he come out here and side with us? He should have done that a long time ago," Dedam said.
The chief thinks it's good that talks continue at a high level. He thinks it's good that Dhaliwal has appointed a mediator, although the fact that the mediator is non-Native gives him cause for concern. It's going to take a lot of work if negotiator James MacKenzie is going to bring the two sides together. A lot of hard questions are going to have to be asked and answered.
"That's what I'm looking for - answers. What did we do wrong? You know, our ancestors signed a treaty, what, 240 years ago, and now that it's been proven in the courts that we're protected under the Constitution, well it's unbelievable hearing the minister saying, 'Look, we're gonna suspend it. To me, they were only looking for loopholes to do it and they couldn't find it," he said.
As the lobster season comes to an end, the Marshall decision looms ominously - for the status quo - over several other resource-based industries: other fisheries, such as eel, smelt, salmon, crab and others will soon feel the changes wrought by the court decision and the backlash from those who will be asked to finally share the resources with the First Nations. Moose hunting season approaches and hunters are worried if they'll be affected by new competitors for the animals. In Harcourt, a town several kilometres west of the Big Cove First Nation (a half-hour's drive due south of Miramichi) Native loggers are already in the woods citing the court decision for their activity. Native legal experts are also looking into the effect of the decision on mining and blueberry gathering.
The mood around the Maritimes suggests more trouble is brewing. A protest in Yarmouth (on the southern tip of Nova Scotia) saw 150 non-Native fishermen dock their boats and protest against the failure of the federal government to protect them from competition from their Native counterparts. Conversation in the coffee shops, pubs and restaurants in Halifax, Moncton and Miramichi suggests that non-Native people aren't interesting in learning about treaty rights and the finer points of constiutional law. They're angry and resentful about the situation and primed for an angry response.
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Alberta judge lays blame in teen suicide
By Joan Black
Windspeaker Staff Writer
MORLEY, Alta.The blame for the suicide of a Stoney Nation youth in 1998 falls squarely on inept and dishonest band leadership that gutted programs that could have helped him, said a judge who directed an inquiry into the death.
Sherman Laron Labelle was 17 when he hanged himself on the Morley reserve May 21,1998.
Judge John Reilly of the Alberta provincial court spared no condemnation of the federal Department of Indian Affairs either, which he says "apparently did nothing about the lack of educational opportunity, the lack of programs for mental health and alcohol treatment and the abuses of power by [the] tribal government." Reilly's report last month to the minister of justice and attorney general calls for the disbanding of the department and a new system for handling tribal money.
The Stoney Nation is currently under the third-party management of Price Waterhouse Cooper.
The judge examined Labelle's personal and community circumstances and the circumstances of Aboriginal Canadians generally in assessing the circumstances of the young man's death. His findings are echoed by the remarks of the only Stoney member who would respond to questions from the media, Greg Twoyoungmen.
Twoyoungmen says he provided about 30 pages of sworn testimony to the inquiry and says Judge Reilly's findings are accurate.
"Well, you know, Judge Reilly's one of the few people who comes onto the reserve, visits with the people, interacts with my people, so he knows what's going on. He's a friend of mine, he comes to my place for tea, coffee, 'cause he's the circuit judge," Twoyoungmen volunteered.
The Stoney Nation, 3,300 members strong, is made up of Wesley, Chiniki and Bearspaw bands, each with a chief and four councillors. Twoyoungmen is a member of Wesley.
The judge said a Stoney tribal council member testified that she kept a diary from 1990 to 1998 which recorded 120 drug and alcohol-related deaths, 48 by suicide. Reilly pointed out this suicide rate is 10 times the national average.
It was further noted Labelle had been in multiple residences, through treatment programs, and had a history of school difficulties. Yet a worker with Stoney Child Services who had worked with Labelle cited a lack of training and support for her role. She said she was among five workers dismissed by the Stoney council.
Reilly went on to say the Stoney Adolescent Treatment Ranch was closed as a result of allegations of sexual abuse by staff.
He points out that the education system, too, is in a shambles.
"A chief who serves on the education committee talked about how the school should have an environment of learning and should involve the parents but he admitted that the facilities at the Morley school are limited and that he sends all three of his own children to off reserve schools," Reilly's report states.
Stoney's school superintendent testified numerous programs had been discontinued three years previous because of funding cutbacks and there had been no graduates from the Morley school for 10 to 12 years, yet there were excess staff on the payroll.
Former members and supporters of the Nakoda Education Management Team (NEMT), which ran education, leadership and life skills programs testified they had 15 graduates between 1992 and 1996, but it was all dismantled after the band election in December 1996. A former Morley high school principal stated Labelle would have been alive if the NEMT had been there for him.
Reilly's report further points out that since June 1997, when he first directed the chief Crown prosecutor to investigate social conditions, political corruption and financial mismanagement at Stoney, he has come to believe "the situation is far worse than I suspected." The judge believes "not only do vested interests divert money that should be going to help the poor members of this reserve, but ... they deliberately sabotage education, health and welfare programs, and economic development in order to keep the people uneducated, unwell, and unemployed so that they can be dominated and controlled."
Fred Jobin, the former Indian Affairs field worker at Stoney, who recently became director for Treaty 8 yet retains responsibility for the Treaty 7 Stoney file, defended the department's involvement in assisting the Stoney administration to repair past mistakes. He attributed many of Stoney's problems to a lack of fiscal and personnel policies. He spoke at length about the third-party management process, how and why it is implemented and the great progress that has been made in terms of Stoney getting its fiscal house in order and creating new policies to avert further problems. He deftly avoided queries about items that are not already public knowledge, spoke in generalities about money, and carefully sidestepped attributing actions or statements to individuals.
Jobin said Indian Affairs intervened two years ago at Stoney because there was "a major deficit; there was concern about basic services being provided. There was a variety of allegations that were circulating. We took action. We initially brought in the firm that is a co-manager. After we received the audit, we went through the audit. We decided to take greater intervention and that's where we imposed third party. In addition to that, at the request of chief and council, we undertook an independent forensic audit by a firm called KPMG."
Jobin was asked where the deficit stood now.
"Their financial situation improved significantly . . . Last year the tribe ran a surplus.
"In terms of Judge Reilly's recommendation in terms of dismantling the department, Jobin shifted blame from Indian Affairs personnel by stating, "well, first of all I don't think it's any secret that the department has stated that the Indian Act is archaic and it needs to be modernized."
Jobin added before there can be a phased withdrawal of third party management from Stoney, financial and human resources policies must be in place and operating, accountability provisions established between council and the community, and key management positions filled.
Twoyoungmen disputed Indian Affairs' contention that the deficit was $5.6 million when third party management was brought in. He alleges it grew a million a month in the nine months following the December 1996 Stoney elections - to $9.1 million.
"That deficit [$5.6 million] wasn't there. It started growing from December '96. We were maybe $100,000, a couple of hundred thousand [in debt]. For an oil-rich reserve, that's not much. It was nowhere near $5.6 million as they claim. Nowhere. That's BS. That's just a fallacy, that's just a snow-job," Twoyoungmen said.
Of Indian Affairs' evasiveness on the tough questions, Twoyoungmen added "That's because they're hiding as well. Incompetent, inefficient, and that million-dollar KMPG audit amounted to nothing. I think it was $3 million, actually, forensic audit. And they're supposed to charge people - 43 charges pending, and not one has been laid."
Calgary RCMP Inspector Don Schlecker would not discuss whether or not charges are imminent. He described the investigation as "ongoing."
"Oh, no, it's not ongoing. It was finished. It's a cover-up by Indian Affairs to cover up their incompetence...," Twoyoungmen alleges.
"I've talked to the council," Jobin said, "and generally . . . they're very reluctant to talk to the media. They feel the media has been critical of them; they feel they've been under a microscope; they feel they've been criticized unfairly. I'm passing on their comments. They feel selected individuals talk to the media and that's what gets reported and it doesn't reflect the full feeling of the tribe."
The tribe's silence notwithstanding, Judge Reilly made several recommendations to prevent deaths as a result of the kind of despair he finds on the Stoney Nation.
"To prevent young Aboriginal people from taking their own lives, there must be a commitment to end the tyranny that dominates and destroys their lives," he stated.
The judge wants the following:
· That a provincial department of justice establish a special prosecutions branch to prosecute crimes against Aboriginal people;
· That the province enact a statute making it an offence for an elected official or a public servant to make a false statement;
· That the provincial department of health and welfare unilaterally provide health care workers to reserves and that Aboriginal workers should be trained to replace non-Aboriginal health workers;
· That the provincial government support Aboriginal education systems;
· That the "department of learning" create mandatory Aboriginal studies courses to dispel skewed ideas about Indians;
· That the provincial government support, through funding, First Nations meetings that will lead to the creation of broad-based First Nations governments;
· That the provincial government take a stand to support the abolition of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada;
· That support be given to economic development in Aboriginal communities, consistent with recommendations given by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples;
· That the provincial government demand the federal government and Indian Affairs "put strict guidelines on monies paid out, so that they in fact go to the people for whom they are intended," Reilly concluded.
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Penitentiary holds workshops on health and healingBy Yvonne Irene Gladue
Windspeaker Staff Writer
DRUMHELLER, Alta.The Native Brotherhood Society held a two-day workshop on the reintegration of the Aboriginal offender into society on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 at the Drumheller Institution in southern Alberta. The workshops were facilitated by a number of guests attending from Alberta's Aboriginal community agencies, and agencies in Saskatchewan and Ontario.
The workshops were initiated for community agencies, the parole board, inmates and the province to mediate, explore innovative ideas and find solutions to help ease the release of inmates and to prevent reoffence.
The Transition and Re-integration of the Aboriginal Offender workshop concentrated on questions from inmates with concerns and issues surrounding their release from prison and the obstacles they have to face, as well as Sections 81 and 84.
According to Corrections Canada, under Section 81, men and women are allowed to be transferred to a non-facility such as a community and placed in custody there. Section 84 allows the inmate to apply for release into an Aboriginal community such as a reserve or an urban Aboriginal institution such as Edmonton's Stan Daniels Correctional Centre.
Elder Chris Stranglingwolf said that Aboriginal communities need to be taught about how to accept ex-inmates back in the community.
"We as Elders of the communities have to help these boys," he said.
The morning session on day one began with a prayer and an honor song performed by singers who were part of the Native Brotherhood group. The first Native Brotherhood Society was formed by a group of Aboriginal inmates at the Prince Albert penitentary in 1962. In 1968 the Brotherhood was formed in Drumheller. The society's goal is to promote the betterment of all Aboriginal inmates. Their motto it to know, to help, and to understand. They attribute the founding fathers as being Chief Big Bear and Chief Poundmaker who were imprisoned in the Stoney Mountain penitentiary following the Riel Rebellion in 1885.
During the workshop, chairs were arranged in four circles and inmates and invited facilitators exchanged questions, answers and suggestions on education, housing, counselling and employment.
"What do we do when we get out of prison and we apply for funding from our bands and we are told that because we haven't lived on the reserve or community for the last few years that we are not eligible for funding?" asked one inmate.
"What do we have to fall back on when we get out of here?" asked another. "A lot of times when we get out of here we do not have anywhere to go. When we go back to our communities we are asked 'what are you doing back here?' A lot of the inmates end up back in here because they have nowhere else to go. They are not welcome back to their communities and no one is around to help them, or accept them even if they've gone through healing programs and rehabilitation,"
"What about counselling in the communities, such as comprehensive programs on anger management? Where can we go to find counselling programs when we get out?" asked another.
Other inmates were concerned about employment, finances, housing and ending up on the streets in urban centres.
"Some of us end up in hostels in the city where we end up feeling frustrated and so we start to drink or get into drugs and we end up back in here again. If there is no way that we can go to school and get an education, and no one wants to hire us, a lot of us inmates end up hanging around city downtown areas," said another inmate.
Facilitators offered suggestions on how to apply for education funding and who to approach when applying through bands or Métis settlements.
The chief of Saskatchewan's Piapot reserve, Murray Ironchild, addressed the inmates.
"Our failure as leaders is that we do not come in here to hear your input as people," said Ironchild. "But since I've been elected chief on my reserve, I've been to the Prince Albert penitentiary and today I'm here to listen to what you have to say," he said.
Among the invited guests was provincial president of the Métis Association, Audrey Poitras.
"I'm here to listen to everyone and then I'd like to know what we can put out there in the community for the inmates," said Poitras. "I do not think that the Métis Nation was involved enough. We want to work with everyone and look at ways to all work together," she said.
Corrections Canada is recognizing that the strength found in Aboriginal communities is an important element in its success of reintegrating Aboriginal offenders into the community.
"By the inmates working together with their communities, while continuing their healing journey, they may find the people and the tools to succeed," said Gerry Cowie, Saskatoon's director for Aboriginal issues, Prairie region.
Former Métis Nation of Alberta board member, Joe Blyan, also addressed the inmates.
"This year will be 31 years since I walked out of jail and told the guard that I was not ever coming back. I found that the first few years were hardest," said Blyan. "We are not consulting with the inmates in prisons as much as we should. We have to start looking at things that will work. Something is failing our kids. We have to find out what it is. As leaders and politicians in our communities we are faced with a dilemma," he said.
Day two's discussion on sections 81 and 84 prompted a number of questions.
Inmates wanted to know what happens if they are released into the communities and they get charged with a minor offence, do they get sent back to prison on a long term offence again? They also wanted to know proper protocol on how and who to approach when applying for release into the communities. They've been hearing about sections 81 and 84 and yet they were not sure what it meant.
Under section 84 the parole board gives the community adequate notice of the parolee's application. The process will then begin after the community and the inmate set up a plan and agree to abide by the conditions outlined in the plan negotiated between the inmate and the community. The community takes the case load of the inmate and takes the responsibility of the inmate while he or she is in the community.
"How do the inmates get to use the opportunities that sections 81 and 84 have to offer when the communities do not want the inmates back there?" asked Blyan.
Correctional Services Canada's project manager, Dale LeClair, suggested that the inmates approach their case workers and look for a community that they would feel comfortable in, write to them, let them know what they would want help in, what kind of rehabilitation courses they were taking while in prison and how well they were doing.
More than 200 people attended the institution's 32nd annual powwow which was held in conjunction with the workshop. The gathering was attended by families of the inmates, invited powwow dancers, inmates and other guests. A traditional feast of moose and buffalo was served for lunch. Inmates serving as hosts greeted the guests, made seating arrangements, served lunch and cleared tables.
"We'd like to welcome you to the close of this millennium and I hope that the next 100 years will continue to see a healing take place for us inmates," said Native Brotherhood co-ordinator and vice chief, Wayne Stonechild.
He risked his life to fight for our freedom
By Pamela Sexsmith Green
Windspeaker Contributor
THUNDERCHILD, Sask.D-Day, June 6, 1944, one of the big battles in the history of the free world. Donald Angus, Gunner, regimental number L11305, Island Tank 3rd Division, was there, deep in the thick of occupied territory.
From the dark, smoky landing in Normandy, to the bloody D-Day battle and final triumphant crossing of the Rhine, he shared in it all - the pain, the glory, the agony - and got out with his life.
He had risked life and limb for his country and fellow soldiers, given his all and came home safe and sound - one of the lucky ones, one of the boys.
It wasn't until he got back home to Canada that Angus realized that he wasn't "one of the boys" any longer. He wasn't on equal footing with the other guys in his squadron. He was a Canadian Native veteran, discriminated against in his own country by the government and people he risked his life to protect. He was a soldier left out in the cold, shut out by the federal government and betrayed by some of his own band members back home on the reserve in Saskatchewan.His story
"It all happened a long time ago, you know. When something like that happened, you just don't forget about it. Sometimes you remember and it's like it just happened yesterday. Even now at night in my dreams I remember. I sit up in bed and then realize I'm safe now. I can never forget, especially when I remember waking up in a trench with three dead Germans.
"When I first decided to enlist, my grandfather, Louis Angus, told me, 'Go ahead, do your best, fight for your country.' He was in the Riel Rebellion, you know, a real fighter. He talked to Poundmaker. My mom and dad, Joe Angus, didn't try to stop me either and they were all glad when I came back alive because there had been so many dead Canadian soldiers on the beach in Normandy."
Angus enlisted as a young man who was hitting his stride in the war years between 1942 and 1946. Starting his military training in Grand Prairie, Alta., he took advanced training in Petawawa, Ont., moved to Halifax and was shipped over to England with the 3rd Division for the D-Day landing, a particularly rough crossing that left many soldiers ill and rolling with seasickness on the decks.
"There were not many Native Canadians in my outfit. We were given special pistol training in England to get ready for the landing. On June 6, 1944, we traveled 22 miles across the English Channel on barges, carrying extra guns, clothing and ammunition. There were air bombers bombing the beaches when we got off the boats. The water was red with blood. The Germans had been there in France for five years, waiting. They had machine guns but they couldn't see us because of the smoke screen. We couldn't see the skies because of the smoke. It was like a big gray cloud up there, but we could hear the screaming of the airplanes as they dropped the bombs. There were dead soldiers lying all over the beach, friends and comrades, wounded and killed."
The Second World War came to a speedy end once the allied troops of Canadian, English, American and Polish soldiers stormed the Germans' encampments.
"The Germans fought back. They were pretty well equipped, you know, in their cement bunkers. They had good weapons, communications and transportation, but they ran out of gas. Soon they were walking out of there or riding horses stolen from the French farms. We pushed on from June to September, through the lines in France, Belgium, Holland and Germany, finally crossing the Rhine when the war was over."
The 3rd Division fought on, up to a week in some of the strategic military strongholds, cleaning up pockets of resistance.
"There were no differences in nationalities among the allied troops. We were all brothers. Native and non-Native officers and soldiers were treated exactly the same. We all depended on each other, watched each other's backs, saved each other's lives. We had no heavy equipment, lived on our wits. We were all fighting for the same thing."
Many fellow soldiers owed their lives to the bravery of the men in the 3rd Division.
"Raymond Sutter from Viking, Alta., you know, the dad from the hockey family, got hit in the leg real bad and we saved him, dragged him to safety. Mike Cosmo from Toronto had his leg blown wide open. He just laid there so I grabbed him, took cover and pulled him to safety. He lost the leg but lived to go home."
Angus faced danger many times but his most hair-raising experience happened in the aftermath of a huge bomb explosion.
"After a long tough night, I jumped into a trench with my machine gun to take cover and sleep. When I woke up there were three Germans sitting there with guns looking at me. I tried to scramble out of the trench and turned to take another look when I saw that they were dead. Sitting up straight, eyes open and dead. They must have been killed by concussion when a bomb went off very close. I had to sit there with them until they called 'all clear' so we could come out."
Even after the fighting was over, the 3rd Division had to deal with groups of dangerous fanatics, men and members of the Hitler Youth Corps who wouldn't give up and wouldn't budge from their manholes.
"Some of them died defending their ground. We had to firebomb them out and many died. They died for Hitler."
When it came right down to basic survival skills, Native Canadian ingenuity came in very handy overseas, said Angus.
"Our troop had pretty good food over there but the French people were starving. Those city guys didn't know how to look after themselves. They had no grub, nothing. We made a big fire, killed a yearling steer and I showed them how to skin it, cut it up and cook it. We had some good punch and potatoes and, oh, those boys were hungry. They said, 'Boy, those Indians sure know how to cook good food!'
After the war was over, the Germans were allowed to go home on foot...and hungry.
"We turned a lot of the road signs around to confuse them and had to clear a lot of dead men, horses, trucks and tanks off the roads. What a stink that was. When we crossed the Rhine and got to Germany we went to a bar on a barge that hadn't been bombed. They opened up three beers for us. Some Germans came and sat with us, shook hands and said, 'You don't know me and I don't know you. Why are we fighting? It's between Hitler and Churchill. You never did nothing to us. Us poor people, we don't want to fight you guys.'"
After an operation and the end of the war, Donald Angus was shipped home to Canada on the Queen Elizabeth.
"I was scared to come home again, but the water was as smooth as glass. We landed in the St. Lawrence River and then went through Quebec City and on to Saskatoon by train. I came home and started to farm. My father and I had broken and plowed land on our reserve, a homesite, cropland and pasture up north, around 300 acres and a new tractor. When I went away, other people put their cattle and horses on my land and a little village had grown up on our homesite. I had no fence.
Buildings and houses on the land that I had broke with my dad with 16 horses, land given to us by the reserve and Indian Affairs was taken away by the chief and given to other people. But there was nothing I could do. I couldn't put other Native people's animals in the pound. It was their land too, on the reserve."
Back in the late forties you had to work to support a family. With no work on the reserve and his wife Louisa Okanee and their five children to provide for, Angus left to go into construction in Red Deer and Vegreville, Alta. He had wanted to farm but had not received the same parcel of farmland that had been given to non-Native veterans.
"That's what all these meeting with the Federal government have been about. We have good pensions but hope they settle this land dispute soon because there are not many [war] veterans left. We are getting too old to farm. They were supposed to give us our own land off-reserve. Instead they gave us land on the reserve, land we already owned and shared. "Canada used to be our country, you know, belonged to all Native people. Ours until they took it away from us and moved us out to the reserves. We fought for Canada, took the same risks as the other soldiers, got the same medals, but when we came home, they didn't want to give us land like the rest of the veterans."
Angus, who attends Remembrance Day ceremonies every year and special D-Day memorial commemorations also attends gatherings of Native Saskatchewan veterans.
"We fought for our land, our country, Canada. Now we are still fighting for our land, the land our Native veterans never received. I want to tell them to hurry up. We are dying out. They are so slow, the government."Dancers' enthusiasm heats up powwow
By Kenneth Williams
Windspeaker Contributor
TORONTORain poured on Ryerson University's Second Annual Traditional Powwow on Oct. 2, forcing the seven drum groups, 100 dancers, and more than 100 spectators to abandon the outdoor bleachers in the Quadrangle, and continue the event indoors. Many of the 32 vendors simply cut their losses and left, leaving only a handful behind in the corridors next to the gymnasium, selling the usual crafts and snacks. Some of the food vendors with barbeques decided to stick it out in the rain selling Indian tacos and macaroni chili.
Even though the heavy rainfall didn't dampen anyone's spirit, the enthusiastic dancing and drumming did. The indoor gym became hot as a sauna after just a few songs, and everyone wandered to the drizzly outdoors to cool off. The momentum of the powwow just seemed to drift away with them.
The organizers considered continuing outside, thinking it was better to dance in the damp than have no powwow at all. But then rain poured harder and the dancers seemed in no mood to continue dancing in the hot gymnasium.
Still, a powwow is more than just dancing, drumming and eating Indian tacos; it's a bonding experience for the Aboriginal community. In a city the size of Toronto, the Aboriginal community gets together whenever it can, and the Ryerson powwow was a success purely on the number of spectators, as the gym and hallways were packed with people mingling, connecting with old friends, and children chasing each other at breakneck speed.
Raven Davis, the powwow co-ordinator, took the bad weather in stride and said that the powwow is there to build an awareness of Ryerson's Aboriginal Student Services, as well as to establish a comfort level for the university's community, staff and faculty with Aboriginal people.
Unlike most university powwows, which are usually organized by the university's Aboriginal students, the Ryerson powwow is co-ordinated and funded by the university itself, and it hired Davis to co-ordinate. She's the only paid person there, but she relies on about 60 volunteers to make the powwow a success.
The university, she said, wanted to make itself more accessible to Aboriginal students.
"It's hard for Aboriginal people to get into mainstream education because they usually have little or no high school education and suffer from high drop out rates," she said. This pow wow lets current and future Aboriginal students know that this university cares about their culture and their education.
