Alliance unites Native nations

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Aboriginal leaders in all parts of the country are using strong words to describe how they feel about the positions taken on Indian Affairs issues by Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day.

#Aboriginal issues were not in the spotlight for the first couple of weeks of the campaign, but remarks made by the Alliance leader in Kamloops, B.C. on Nov. 15 started a process that led to protests and demonstrations at each successive stop on the Day campaign.

"We believe policies must lead to full, free and non-discriminatory participation of Native people in society. It requires a break from the past," Day said.

His party is on the record as being in favor of eliminating the tax-exempt rights of Native people, of instituting direct, private ownership of reserve lands, of eliminating what the Alliance calls "race-based" access to fisheries and other resources and of turning band councils into municipal-style governments.

All these positions are similar to those in the White Paper on Indian Affairs that then-Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and his Indian Affairs Minister Jean Chretien attempted to implement in 1969.

After a bitter struggle at that time, Native leaders were able to convince Trudeau to shelve the White Paper. Trudeau conceded that he hadn't appreciated the strength of the legal position the chiefs were arguing.

One of the main Native leaders in that fight was Harold Cardinal who, 31 years later, became a candidate for the Liberals in the northern Alberta riding of Athabasca. Cardinal told a chiefs' assembly in Edmonton on Nov. 1 that he accepted the invitation to run for the Liberals because he sees the Alliance position as a threat to his people.

"I was asked to run last summer," he told the chiefs, "and I agreed to meet with the prime minister. As many of you will recall, he and I had a fairly rigorous encounter over the Canadian White Paper policy. We decided to put our past differences aside."

Cardinal said he felt a strong need to do his part to defeat the Alliance.

"If it was a nutty right wing organization that was making the proposal that had no chance in hell, you might say let sleeping dogs lie. That is not the case," he said. "You're all familiar with the kind of B.S. that's being pumped into the Canadian people. As long as we remain silent on the sidelines, we are in danger of handing the right wingers a victory by default."

He said his Alliance opponent in Athabasca, Dave Chatters, had said that Ottawa's policy of recognizing special rights for Native people was "rubbish."

"So now we're faced with the prospect of having 26 MPs in this province taking the position that our rights are rubbish," he said. "We can't let that go unanswered. We have to move."

Cardinal said he understood that many Native people believe they shouldn't vote in Canadian elections, but he suggested that this time it was a matter of survival.

Native leaders say the Alliance's insistence on equality is a smoke-screen, a dishonest way to candy-coat the party's agenda of doing away with Native rights. They say forcing Native people - who have distinct cultures and a distinct world view - into conforming to Eurocentric values and culture is nothing but assimilation, and forcing distinct peoples to assimilate against their will is called cultural genocide. Throughout the campaign (as of publication deadline on Nov. 22), the Alliance leader has quietly refused to get into a debate on the merits of his party's Native platform. He was challenged to a debate in his home British Columbia riding of Okanagan-Coquahalla by Neskonlith First Nation Chief Arthur Manuel. Manuel said Day's staff told him the party leader was too busy to participate in that debate. Attempts by Windspeaker to question Day or any other Alliance spokesperson about the details of the party platform were ignored.

Day has refused to engage in any debate on Native issues. When First Nations Party of Saskatchewan leader Brendan C (who's running federaly for the Canadian Action Party) forced his way onto the stage to confront Day during a campaign stop in Moose Jaw, Sask. in October, Day's only remarks were that Cross should get off the stage.

Aboriginal leaders all over the country are urging their members to get out and vote. Dwight Dorey, president of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, a group that lobbies for the rights of off-reserve residents, endorsed the Liberals.

"My biggest fear is that an Alliance government under Mr. Day would actually implement its policy on Aboriginal peoples," he said. "It's an appalling conglomeration of assimilationist intentions that would set Aboriginal peoples and Canada's Aboriginal policies back 100 years.