Saskatchewan Metis election process in question

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While serious doubts have been raised about the validity of the Metis Nation of Saskatchewan (MNS) election results, the Saskatchewan government says it is not assuming the lead role in alleviating grassroots concerns about alleged election irregularities.

Concerns about irregularities have led, however, to a review of Metis Nation of Saskatchewan election procedures in which the province and the federal government play a part.

The findings could have profound implications for the Metis National Council's election results as well.

The $35,000 review is being undertaken by Marilyn Poitras, a Saskatchewan-born Metis lawyer, who was approved for the job by the Metis Nation of Saskatchewan and both levels of government.

Saskatchewan's minister of Intergovernmental and Aboriginal Affairs Pat Lorje stressed that her government does not want to intervene in Metis Nation politics and that it is up to the Metis Nation to take whatever action it deems necessary when it has all the facts. At the same time, she acknowledged that they have a memorandum of understanding that commits the province to work with the Metis on various issues.

"We had numerous people phoning and complaining," said Lorje about why there will be a review, "meeting me on the street and so forth. There are a lot of concerns about the election."

She said the previous Aboriginal Affairs minister wrote a letter that suggested "we would want to be satisfied that the elections had been full, fair, open and accountable."

Poitras is studying Metis elections in the province back to 1995 and will table her final report Nov. 15.

"It's emotionally charged like crazy," Poitras said on Sept. 24. "I'm still in the process of gathering everybody's stories about what happened.

"It's really important that people understand that what's happening is not a public inquiry. There is such a high need for a forum for people to air their concerns that this has turned into a forum for whatever the concern happens to be, and people are misinterpreting the study as a public inquiry and that's absolutely not what's going on."

She said no public hearings are being held in communities. People are volunteering to come forward with information.

"The mandate is quite narrow. This is not about looking at all the problems with the election and getting rid of the current leadership. This is just about problems that happened generally over the last three elections and coming up with some recommendations to make sure the election process is fair and incorporating some democratic principles into this, so the elections run a little more smoothly.

"My mandate doesn't go as far as a review of the last election so that the results don't stand," said Poitras," and lots of that is still in the internal appeal process with the MNS. I believe it still has to go to their legislative assembly in order for the decisions to be finalized. It has gone through the elections committee and it has gone through the senate."

She added her recommendations are as binding as any recommendations.

"It is up to the MNS to incorporate them."

Lorje said, "We decided that it would be prudent to assist with the government of Canada in doing a review of the election. But I have to emphasize that we're walking a fine line here."

She underlined that the federal government also has a responsibility to the Metis people.

Some Metis, such as Ed Harper, president of Saskatoon local 126 for five years and a member of a group he calls Citizens for Democracy in Metis Government, are concerned that despite the review some executive members who may be in office inappropriately will be deciding on their own right to remain there.

"It looks like the Metis Nation of Saskatchewan has initiated an exercise to investigate themselves, so ot speak," Harper said.

"What happened is, after the election, the MNS was in negotiations with the provincial government and the federal government in order to sign an extension to their triartite agreement." One of the conditions the Saskatchewan government imposed upon the MNS before it would sign was that the MNS would have to "reinvestigate the past election," according to Harper.

He said he doesn't think the senate or the Metis elections commission had the right to "overturn the decision of the people."

He said the commission "acted out of their mandate, and they threw out a lot of ballot boxes, etcetera, which affected the outcome of the election . . . on mere minor technicalities.

"Certainly those reasons given by the Metis elections commission were not enough to throw out and disqualify ballot boxes throughout the province."

Lorna Docken, MNS vice president said, however, that "People had been given a couple of years to get their voters' lists up to date, when our citizenship act was brought in in 1999. So I guess over a year had transpired between when the act had come in and when the election took place.

"And so what happened was, people were missed off the list. And there was no such thing as declarations. So if you weren't on the list, you didn't get to vote.

"Now as for myself, I was, I guess, one of the victims of this. I had given the elections office the names of my four children who are of voting age, and two of them made it on the list and two of them didn't.

"I think that we all have to take a little bit of responsibility. Me, for not checking to make sure (my children's names) were on there. And then the local presidents for not making sure that their lists were up-to-date. Because the elections office was just swamped. Everybody sent their names in at the last minute, and they had to compile a voters' list out of this. That was the biggest problem.

"And because of that, their ballot boxes were thrown out. Like, we have an elections act that stated that the voters' list could not be changed after a certain date, and on election day some locals actually added people onto the list."

Docken said that was understandable becaus "everybody should have the right to vote. But rules are rules, and our rules stated that you couldn't do that."

Harper said he hopes Poitras recommends they have another MNS election, "run by an unbiased third party." Alternatively he wants to see reinstated the people who were elected.

He said he was "very surprised with the leadership of the MNS," that it did not refuse to "validate" the decision of the commission.

The result has larger implications.

"The whole situation in Saskatchewan has had a profound effect on the Metis movement at the national level," Harper said.

He complains that five "individuals who were given their positions on a silver platter by the elections commission" in Saskatchewan were not voted in. "They lost the election."

Harper said he is referring to four area directors and vice-president Lorna Docken. He said the five went to Vancouver in July and participated in the Metis National Council elections. With their own positions in question, Harper said he questions the legitimacy of any national votes they cast while the MNS election results are under review.

As a result of his stance on these issues, Harper said MNS officials are telling his local he is no longer president, but he plans "to hang in there."