News In Brief

Page 16

New Aboriginal Affairs minister

Gordon Wilson gave up the leadership of the Progressive Democratic Alliance party to become the new Aboriginal Affairs Minister in early February.

"I am very pleased that Gordon Wilson has joined our government. He has invaluable experience and new ideas to bring to the table," said Premier Glen Clark. "I believe the addition of Gordon Wilson to our cabinet team will ensure that the government responds more effectively to the challenges facing the province."

Clark said that as minister of Aboriginal affairs, Wilson will build on the work of former minister Dale Lovick by implementing the Nisga'a agreement and furthering the current series of First Nations negotiations.

"Gordon Wilson has been a strong advocate for our First Nations people and their quest for social justice," Clark added.

Former minister Dale Lovick remains the minister of labor.

Union ready for a fight

Three days of talks in late January are just the start as 50 Interior chiefs and community leaders prepare to increase the pressure for a more direct response to the Delgamuukw decision from federal and provincial governments.

Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs president Stewart Phillip said the people who attended the three-day think-tank are considering a number of options to assert their claim to Aboriginal title.

"Suggestions included tackling the bureaucratic cop-out by provincial regional managers who say they are "just following orders" in continuing to issue licenses and tenures to third party interests on Aboriginal lands; launching an international human rights campaign; demanding a judicial review of the federal government's 1986 Comprehensive Claims Policy and the physical occupation of Aboriginal title lands," Chief Phillip said.

Sechelt man's design selected for new coin

Jason Edward Read, a 23-year-old North Vancouver resident, is one of 12 artists (out of 33,000 entries) whose work was selected to adorn the back of a millennium edition quarter.

The Royal Canadian Mint announced that Read was one of the dozen winners of its Create a Centsation contest which was conducted last summer. The announcement was made in January.

A new quarter will be released each month this year. Read's design, entitled, A Tribute to First Nations, will be featured on the coin issued in October. It features a drawing, in the West Coast Aboriginal artistic style, combining the images of an eagle, a bear, a killer whale and an eagle.

Read is a student at Vancouver's Institute of Indigenous Studies who has only been pursuing an interest in the arts for a couple of years.

A ceremony to launch the new coin will be held at Vancouver's Museum of Anthropology on Oct. 4.