National chief questioned by executive

Page 1

Several members of the Assembly of First Nations executive council travelled to Montreal in the second week of April to meet with the national chief.

"We asked him what his plans were," Manitoba Vice Chief Kenneth Young told Windspeaker.

The executive meeting in Montreal on April 8 dealt with the issue of Chief Matthew Coon Come's absence at meetings. Young said it was quite a few meetings, more than the two that have been reported to date.

He said the executive members didn't ask Coon Come to step down, but they did ask if he planned on continuing.

"We had a meeting on a whole slew of things regarding his performance. The executive really can't say, 'Matthew your goose is cooked.' That's up to the chiefs, the people that elected him. We're in a tough situation when we start demanding his resignation because we didn't elect him," Young said. "I was concerned. I was on a conference call and no national chief again. I asked where he was and I said 'I'm not staying on the line one more minute.' I suggested that we better have a meeting soon and it happened on [April 8]."

The vice chief said the air was cleared at the Montreal gathering.

"It was actually a good meeting but what comes out of it, I don't know. I've been concerned for quite some time now, but we'll see," he said. "We had a good session there. We came to an understanding. We asked him what his plans were. He said he was going to hang in there. That's fine. We didn't come to any serious blows over that. I actually had thought that he might say that he was leaving."

While the national chief missed the last meeting of the executive and the Indian Affairs minister on Jan. 28, the next meeting with the minister on May 10 should be interesting. Minister Robert Nault sent out an open letter to the national chief on April 16.

"On January 28, your executive and I met to openly discuss matters of mutual interest. It is unfortunate you were unable to attend. I would like to take this opportunity to follow-up on one of the concerns raised at this meeting," the minister wrote. "A specific request was made regarding whether I would consider agreeing to provide funding to facilitate the restructuring of the Assembly of First Nations organization. At that time, I noted that I was supportive of these efforts, and would consider the level of funding for this undertaking upon receipt of a detailed proposal.

"Since that time, I understand that the AFN executive met to consider your current organizational challenges. I would welcome the opportunity to meet with you and your executive to discuss any conclusions that were reached at this meeting and scope out possible next steps."

Young explained that a number of vice chiefs want to change the way the AFN operates. But the Manitoba vice chief is worried that the minister may provide the money and then insist on controlling the process.

"I actually spoke against that. I said restructuring is not going to solve our problem. The problem we have is that we don't have a plan. Changing the structure is not going to provide a forward motion for First Nations."

Coon Come angered many chiefs when he spoke of changing the AFN charter so that grassroots people could vote for national chief. He said a constituency of a million Native voters would be more credible than a constituency of 633 chiefs. But Young said that's not what the executive has in mind.

"That's not going to happen," he said. "Too many chiefs will argue against that."

Asked what might be on the table in restructuring talks, Young floated a few ideas.

"The only idea that I have at the moment is that we look at the charter and get it amended. The nations should be represented by treaty territories, and where there's no treaties, based on Aboriginal title. That's something that we can work out. Treaty 1 to 11, Robinson-Huron Treaty, Canada's covered with treaties," he said.

Young said the idea to restructure was a response to the failure of the governance worklan where the executive had a deal worked out that they saw as workable only to see it defeated by the chiefs in assembly. His idea would have fewer chiefs involved in the national decision-making process and would, perhaps, mean no surprises on the convention floor.

Other details could be smoothed out if there's a budget for restructuring, Young added.

"I think reorganizing some of the aspects of the charter, for instance, if the national chief is not available, somebody else could chair the meetings. It's there right now that the national chief has to chair the meetings," he said. "And get rid of some of the confederacy meetings. It costs a lot of money. We could hold special assemblies as required."

He said there should be an annual general meeting in July and a general meeting in December.

Attempts to ask the minister's office if he is willing to fund a plan that would lower the number of participants in the AFN decision-making process were unsuccessful due to time differences between Edmonton and Ottawa. Several calls to the AFN Ottawa headquarters this month were not returned.