Carrier Sekani appeal to U.S. president

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Is U.S. President Bill Clinton coming to northern B.C. - perhaps even to Burns Lake? He will - if Carrier Sekani Tribal Chief Justa Monk has his way.

Despite recent setbacks, like the Feb. 4 Supreme Court of Canada decision not to get involved in the dispute, Monk has vowed to continue his decade-long fight against Alcan's Kemano Completion Project (Kemano 2). Monk's tribal council, based in Prince George, consists of 10 Indian bands, including the Cheslatta Carrier Nation. Monk knows the Cheslatta story well and he also knows the Kemano project poses a real threat to the survival of his people.

"If the Nechako River dies, my people die. If we don't fight, we will die like the river," he told reporters at a news conference in Prince George last November. Tribal council chiefs, including Cheslatta Chief Marvin Charlie, joined together at that news conference to call for a full federal-provincial inquiry into Alcan's Kemano projects so the full truth could be told - to Native and non-Native people alike.

In 1987 Alcan and the governments of B.C. and Canada reached a secret deal on the Nechako's water. They decided Alcan could have 87 per cent for its Kemano 2 project, while the people along the river and the wildlife, waterfowl and fish could have 13 per cent. The people were shut out of this deal six years ago and they've been shut out every year since, by one secret deal after another. It's time for the secrecy to stop and it's time for the truth about the full impacts of the Kemano projects to come out - before Alcan is allowed to put another spade in the ground. The planned provincial review falls short.

Having been given token audiences by their governments or having had doors slammed in their faces, it's no wonder people like Monk are turning to someone who might listen, like Clinton, even if it seems like a long shot. Monk expresses that kind of frustration in a recent letter to Clinton, inviting him to Canada.

"Mr. President, we are a small Nation seeking help from you because we have tried politically and legally to convince the people involved in this agreement this is not going to work and that they are going to dry out a river and do away with our First Nations' way of life. We have been fighting this since the early 1950s and to date we have tried the court system and a political system, which have both failed us."

Monk invited Clinton's help to save the dying Nechako, noting it's "one of the main rivers that feeds my people and is also used by non-Aboriginal people along the river." He also told Clinton the tragic story of the Cheslatta people, who were flooded off their land by Kemano 1.

"They were flooded out overnight. This totally divided the people and placed them in isolation of one another, which damaged their culture, their way of life and to date they are still suffering the consequences. Alcoholism has taken the best of my people of this Nation because of the drastic change of life they had to face overnight.

"Through the wisdom of our elders we have been educated to respect what Mother Nature has put in this world for each and every one of us. If we don't respect it now, rivers such as the Nechako will be totally damaged and will never be seen by our children. I don't believe, as the present generation, we should be greedy for today and forget about tomorrow. We have to leave something for our young people in this world so they will enjoy what we are now enjoying," said Monk.

If Clinton does accept Monk's invitation, he wouldn't be butting into Canada's affairs since the Fraser River fishery is important to both Canadian and American fishermen - Native and non-Native. At least nine Indian nations in the U.S. catch sockeye salmon, which come from Canada's Fraser River. The river, the world's most productive salmon waterway, is of equal importance to non-Native American fishermen. Clinton would also have another good reason for jumping into the debate. Canada is destroying a big chun of northern B.C. to produce Kemano 2 power, which would be sold to power-hungry states like California.

To give Clinton a better understanding of Kemano 2, Monk sent him a copy of the excellent 25-page chapter on the Nechako from Mark Hume's book The Run of the River. In it Hume, an award-winning writer, quotes Dr. Don Alderdice, who for years has valiantly expressed his concerns about Kemano 2. Alderdice, a retired salmon physiologist, who worked for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for 49 years,

has studied the project in depth. His conclusion: "The Kemano Completion flows are going to be disastrous, absolutely catastrophic."

Hume's Nechako chapter is essential reading for anyone who wants to get a quick and clear understanding of Kemano 2. Let's hope Clinton finds time to give it a read, when he takes a break from the many problems facing him in the States. And let's hope he does come for a visit to B.C., he apparently wouldn't be the first U.S. president to do so. It seems former president Herbert Hoover was made an honorary member of the Carrier Nation in the 1950s.