It may come as a surprise that like China, the governance in Canada is also based on the principle of “One country, two systems.” The two systems are the democratic system under which non-aboriginal Canadians are governed, and the colonial Indian Act system under which aboriginals have been governed since 1876. As many well-meaning Canadians are not exposed to Canada’s colonial history or the Indian Act, most wrongfully assume there is only one governing system and native reserves are run just like our municipalities. So when traumatic news came out from any reserve, few can understand the root cause or the solution.
Take the example of the recent native housing crisis at the remote reserve (fly in only except ice road for a few winter months) at Attawapiskat, on the west edge of James Bay. With temperature dipping to -20C and some families huddling in tents (unheated, no running water, no toilet), the band finally appealed to Canadian Red Cross for help. After Red Cross arrived with heaters and sleeping bags, embarrassed politicians in damage control mode rushed in. Through the media, they as well as Canadians offered all kinds of rationale and fixes for the exposed inhumanity on Canadian soil. The rationale ranges widely from the natives do not know how to manage housing funds, to natives would trash their new house in a year. The suggested fixes include better education for native children, better housing construction in the first place, to this one which should not be let off the hook so quick:
Ottawa strips Attawapiskat of authority over its finances – The Globe and Mail – http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-strips-attawapiskat-of-authority-over-its-finances/article2255341/
To begin with, those who went up with me to bring emergency food to Mt. Currie Reserve on Dec 30, 2009 would recall meeting the single dad and his baby in a 7 feet by 12 feet un-insulated garden shack amidst the ice and snow, or the single man at another totally isolated and abandoned shack, again with no water or power supply. So our political leader who is supposed to know more than we common people should really not sound surprised when in Canada, there are probably another hundred desperate native housing crisis like Attawapiskat.
Furthermore the facts and timeline of the housing and infrastructure crisis in Attawapiskat are in government files, even in Wikipedia for all to see: ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attawapiskat_First_Nation )
· 1979 30,000 gallons of diesel leaked from underground pipes was spilled underneath the J.R. Nagokee School (houses grades 1-8) recently built (1976). It was the largest spill in Northern Ontario.[29]
· May 11, 2001 J.R. Nagokee School Elementary was closed because of health problems related to 1979 diesel spill. Since then the elementary school students are in portables.[30]
· 2000 Minister Robert Nault agreed in 2000 to begin plans for a new school. Two successive INAC ministers, Andy Scott and Jim Prentice also promised a new school for Attawapiskat. You can read the full chronology of seven years of negotiations on the departmental website. On April 1, 2008, the new minister, Chuck Strahl, informed AFNEA that Ottawa would not finance the new school after all. [31]
· December 2007 The new Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl cancelled the plans for a new school claiming there were other communities who took priority and that there were no health and safety concerns in Attawapiskat.
· May 2008 – Hundreds of people are evacuated from the community after a state of emergency is declared. The threat stems from the possibility of ice jams in the Attawapiskat River and subsequent flooding.[32]
· 2009 Members of the Attawapiskat First Nation blocked a winter road block near the DeBeers Victor Mine to protest the fact that the Attawapiskat First Nation cannot benefit from the project.
· July 11, 2009 A massive sewage flood dumps waste into eight buildings, which house 90 people. DeBeers provided two temporary trailers to house the evacuees once they return. Those people still live in the trailers. [33]
· August 21, 2009 Community members traveled to Toronto to confront De Beers Canada about the growing prosperity of the company and the growing poverty in the community. [34]
· October 14, 2009 – Chief Theresa Hall raises concerns about the federal government’s lack of response to the housing crisis in Attawapiskat caused by the sewage back-up. The government claimed it had committed $700,000 to repair homes.[35]
· October 28, 2011 – Attawapiskat First Nations leadership calls a state of emergency for the third time in three years. Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan claimed that officials in his department were unaware of Attawapiskat’s housing problems until Oct. 28, despite having visited the community many times this year [36].
· 2011 December 1 The Canadian Red Cross mobilized to help meet immediate needs in the community of Attawapiskat. The Red Cross continues to work closely with public authorities and the community to identify and address urgent, short-term needs. At the request of the community the Red Cross will also take on a donation management role to support these needs as identified. [37]
· CBC journalist Adrienne Arsenault visited Attawapiskat to access the situation December 2, 2011. [38]Alarmed at Attawapiskat’s housing problems, she dismissed claims by Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan that on an emergency basis there was adequate clean, dry available shelter with running water and electricity available in the community citing public buildings such as the healing centre and sportsplex. Arsenault, was particularly concerned about the most at-risk groups, which includes elderly people and children, argued that the healing centre building which is five kilometers out of town has neither running water or phones lines.
Instead of repenting over what Canada has done to these abandoned people, Harper chose to throw Canadians off his tracks by quoting $90 million was spent on Attawapiskat since 2006, and attributing its woes to its leaders’ inability to manage the millions. Since few Canadians are exposed to an honest colonial history of Canada, few understand why our government pays for native housing in the first place (never mind paying for consultant to manage its finances). His quote with no context was calculated to mislead Canadians into thinking how “generous” Canada has been and how irresponsible were the native leaders. On December 3, the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs issued a statement indicating “Government of Canada has engaged in a game of ‘political deflection’ at this time of community crisis.” While Harper’s response tried to drive a wedge further between Canadians and Indigenous People, this metis website offered a very clear contextual response which every Canadian should read: http://apihtawikosisan.wordpress.com/2011/11/30/dealing-with-comments-about-attawapiskat/.
On aboriginal issues, most politicians skirt around the problem because of the large vested interest to hide Canada’s colonial history. Not having been exposed to Canada’s colonial history at school, few realize Canada had neither won an all out war against nor signed bona fide treaties with all Indigenous nations. Few realized in 1867 when the British Parliament passed the British North America Act to unite the 5 eastern colonies to form the new nation Canada, no Indigenous Nation was invited for discussion or to obtain consent for the formation of a country upon its land. No Indigenous Nation was even informed of such happening. In order to expand from sea to sea afterwards, the new Canada sent out Indian Agents to make treaties with the various Indigenous Nations in other provinces. The agents claimed they did so in the Queen’s name. As a result, the treatied Nations thought their treaties were with the British Crown and continue to believe so today. Canada has thus committed a massive fraud but has consistently used such post-confederation Treaties Number 1-11 as evidence of having Title to the native lands.
In 1982, when Canada patriated its constitution from England, it had to redefine its new legal position with respect to Indigenous Nations “the Queen” formerly had signed treaties with. So Section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982 explicitly acknowledges and affirms aboriginal and treaty rights, both those that existed and those that may be acquired by the then fully sovereign Canada. In 1982 R. v. Guerin, the first Supreme Court of Canada decision handed down after the Constitution Act 1982, declared that aboriginal title was sui generis (so unique it cannot really be compared) and that the federal government has a fiduciary duty to preserve it. Since Canada’s fiduciary duties towards the Indigenous People is seldom publicly acknowledged, most Canadians think the natives are receiving “race-based” preferential treatments like housing, education and health care whereas fiduciary duties are internationally acknowledged legal obligations of the colonizer towards the colonized: http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/LOP/researchpublications/prb0009-e.htm and are further protected under article 25 and 26 within UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Back in Attawapiskat, there is another background player which makes this sad saga look like James Cameron’s 2009 Science Fiction movie Avatar. The De Beers Canada Victor Mine, which was hardly mentioned in the news, is located approximately 90 kilometres west of Attawapiskat within its traditional territory. It is the first diamond mine in Ontario and the second De Beers mine outside of Africa. According to the natives, except for a few individuals, the positive economic impact on the village has been negligible. While the community had great success in securing employment during its construction phase, it has been a struggle to find employment once into operation phase since that require industrial certifications and advanced training. Meanwhile, the land, animals are highly impacted and the fish have elevated levels of mercury. As eight million liters of diesel fuel is transported over 350 km annually, spills are of great concern as they are often covered up unreported. The water tastes different and people are seeing deformed fish. There was disturbance to the caribou migration—don’t see them anymore. Moose reduced as well. “Instead of cutting off your arms and feet like they did in Africa, they are cutting off our land, our food from the people.” lamented an Aboriginal Liaison Youth Worker. On its part, the Victor Mine reached full production in July 2008, is expected to produce 6 million carats and create $6.7 billion in GDP growth for Ontario.