First Nations Education Act challenged at Toronto rally

The First Nations Education Act proposed by the federal government has sparked angry protests across the country.

On Dec. 4, six horses decked out in beadwork and Pendleton blankets led a protest march up Yonge Street to the Aboriginal Affairs office at 25 St. Clair Avenue.

About 300 people marched behind, stopping for a round dance on Yonge Street. The marchers stopped again for a drum song at the busy intersection of Yonge and St. Clair, halting streetcars and noon hour traffic.

Upon arrival at Aboriginal Affairs, Gord Peters, grand chief of the Association of Iroquois and Allied Indians (AIAI), wrapped bright yellow quarantine tape across the front of the building. The people in the building are sick and they cause a disease called genocide, said Peters.

“Every piece of legislation that they put out there is designed for one thing and one thing only,” said Peters. “It’s to assimilate us. It’s to take away our languages and our cultures, and if they can take away our languages and our cultures, they can take away our land. That’s the real objective of this legislation. They’re trying to get access to our lands and resources.”

Chief Greg Peters of the Delaware Nation said he and some of the leadership had gone upstairs to personally tell Aboriginal Affairs staff that, ‘We’re not gonna accept their legislation without consultation.’ He told the people assembled, “We’re in a fight. We’re in a fight for our lives here. These are our children. This is our future.”

Chippewas of the Thames Chief Joe Miskokomon said the Union of Ontario Indians has been trying to negotiate a self government agreement about education for 17 years.

“And yet this government comes in and is attempting to push a piece of legislation down our throats in 17 months without once talking to us, without once consulting any First Nation. These are not educators,” he said. “They’re bureaucrats.” Miskokomon urged people not to give up the fight and to challenge the story being told by the minister regarding the funding currently provided for education, which is less than half the amount received to educate non-First Nations children.

“We gotta stop the lies,” Miskokomon said. “Our children’s future is at stake.”

Grand Chief Pat Madahbee of the Anishinabek Nation told the crowd, “If there ever was a time for us to be unified, it’s now. We’ve got to tell this government in no uncertain terms that there’s no way, shape or form that we’re gonna accept this piece of garbage. We’ve been working on our own education system, we’ve been talking about Indian control of Indian education for years and they’re not listening. They never listen. We love our children. There’s no way we can let them do this to us anymore.”

“We have to become really good critical thinkers, really good people and follow our own cultural ways to be able to fight back,” Peters said. “They tried to take that away with residential schools. They tried to take away our language and culture,” he said. “As long as we all have that, they’ll never take our lands and resources.” He challenged those assembled to learn their language, participate in ceremonies and to be strong, “because that’s our future,” he said.

The Toronto rally was organized by AIAI and Toronto Council Fire Cultural Centre. Similar rallies were held the same day in three other locations across Ontario – Sudbury, Thunder Bay and Brantford.

The Chiefs of Ontario at their Assembly in Thunder Bay in November passed a resolution rejecting the proposed First Nations Education Act and collectively affirmed the inherent right of First Nations to establish and control their own educational systems and institutions.