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The National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation set up shop in Calgary April 4 to pay tribute to 14 accomplished member of the Native community in Canada.

The foundation's annual achievement awards gala was a lavish affair, bringing together a who's who of the Aboriginal elite and the corporate connected.

Playing host to the foundation's guests were legendary Tennessee singer Rita Coolidge and musician/actor Tom Jackson, a veteran of six of the 11 award shows the foundation has held.

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Artist-Wayne Lavallee

Album-Green Dress

Song-Green Dress

Label-Independent

Producer-

Kevin Kane

with Wayne Lavallee

Important sound, lyrics in new CD from the coast

Wayne Lavallee has the most interesting voice. Think the growls that set rocker Melissa Ethridge apart, and the amazing range of Simply Red. Then think about putting that on the powwow trail and you've got an approximation of the material that can be found on Green Dress.

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Onondaga photographer Jeff Thomas was in elementary school when he first discovered that he was invisible. Although his family lived in Buffalo, New York, for most of the year-along with a large population of other Iroquois people-he couldn't find any Native people in the official history of America's cities. He might not have known it then, but this realization was the beginning of a life's work.

Page 15

Carol Greyeyes - Performer/Writer

Recommends: The Hundred Secret Senses

By Amy Tan

Vintage Books, New York-1996

A friend gave me this book last Christmas and I only got around to reading it now. Maybe it's because I have lost loved ones recently, but I was so moved by this story about sisters, loyalty and families, love and death. The Hundred Secret Senses covers the lives of two women and several generations of relationships.

Page 15

Across Time and Tundra: The Inuvialuit of the Western Arctic

By Ishmael Alunik, Eddie D. Kolausok and David Morrison

Raincoast Books

230 pages (hc), $65.00

For centuries the Inuvialuit people have called the Western Arctic home. Their traditional territory ran from Barter Island in the west to Franklin Bay in the east, with the Mackenzie River running through the centre.

Page 14

A Chiefs of Ontario letter shows that the fight over who votes and who doesn't at the Assembly of First Nations' twice-annual confederacy meetings will resume at the next chiefs' meeting in May.

National Chief Phil Fontaine sent a letter to all First Nation chiefs and councils on March 18, announcing that "the next Confederacy of Nations to be held at Saskatoon, Saskatchewan on May 18, 19, 20, 2004 will be conducted in accordance with Article 11 of the AFN Charter."

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The decision to cancel or not to cancel the 2005 North American Indigenous Games (NAIG) was set to be made by the games' governing council on April 23, two days after Windspeaker's publication deadline.

Although the bid committee had made its recommendation to the full NAIG Council during a conference call on April 20, council President Harold Joseph said he could not disclose what decision had been made until after the April 23 meeting.

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After proclaiming her innocence for almost a year, Grand Chief Margaret Swan changed her plea to guilty in late March.

The Southern (Manitoba) Chiefs Organization grand chief stood accused of misappropriating $61,000 from her band two years ago when she was chief of the Lake Manitoba First Nation.

When she pleaded guilty to theft over $5,000, a fraud charge was dropped.

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A senior government official warned us a week before Indian Affairs Minister Andy Mitchell's speech at the Canada-Aboriginal Roundtable meeting in Ottawa on April 19 that it would be a "launch pad" for the Paul Martin agenda.

It was. The Indian Affairs minister laid out a number of details about what his department will be doing to further the prime minister's plan to make Aboriginal issues a government priority.

Page 9

On Feb. 6, after a three-day trial, Arlo Looking Cloud, 49, was convicted of aiding and abetting in the murder of Anna Mae Pictou-Aquash.

Now there's another trial that may soon be heard in regards to her death, and a man waits in Vancouver under house arrest to see if Canada will ship him across the border to face prosecution in a United States court.