'Wait and see,' says national chief

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The national chief believes he can take control of the agenda when it comes to modernizing the Indian Act because his organization has a much better understanding of what First Nations need than does the Department of Indian Affairs.

Bob Nault, the minister of Indian Affairs, announced in a series of media interviews over a month ago that he wants to introduce a First Nations governance act by the fall. He wants to conduct widespread consultations across the country and then use the information collected during the consultations to frame an act that will allow the Indian Act to serve the interests of First Nations people while self government agreements are negotiated.

The Indian Act is widely seen as inadequate because it does not provide a legislative framework that allows a band council government to function effectively.

Matthew Coon Come, the national chief, said it is still very early in the process, but he'll do everything he can to ensure that the chiefs are equal partners with the department as the consultation process unfolds. He also said he will continue to meet with other ministers, including the prime minister, and will continue to apply pressure on Canada by lobbying at the international level in order to push the government to take concrete actions that will live up to the promises of the Jan. 30 Throne Speech.

"Minister Nault has what I call 'trial ballooned' his governance act to deal with some of the issues we?ve all read about in the papers," the national chief told Windspeaker on Feb. 21. "One of the things that we wanted to do, and I did meet with Minister Nault, was to say it is difficult to try to make comments on an act when you do not see what it entails. There is no draft of the governance act. We do not have a copy. We've asked around within Indian Affairs to see if anyone has seen it thus far. There is no draft. What the minister is saying is that he will seek a mandate from the cabinet. Following that mandate, he will proceed to do a consultation right across the country."

He said AFN staff discovered the minister has not yet been given the go-ahead from cabinet to begin the process that will lead to the passage of a new law that Nault hopes will strengthen weak areas of the Indian Act. That gives the AFN time to make sure it plays a major role in the process, should it begin.

"What I believe that he's doing is, he's trying to "trial balloon" as to what would be acceptable, trying to talk to individual chiefs, that's what he said. He's talking to individual chiefs, and to the membership as a whole. Therefore, he's trying to react and trying to deal with the issues raised by the members. Our initial position as an assembly is we do have existing structures in place" Coon Come said. "We have joint initiatives and agreements. We have models that we've looked at. We have a list of various amendments to the Indian Act over the years, and it cannot be achieved without direct participation of the First Nations."

Although the minister announced his intentions without seeking the approval of the AFN, Coon Come said he believes he can force his way into the picture.

"I do have plans to develop a strategy, to convey what we see should be in a governance act. In other words, I'm trying to cut him off at the pass so that he will have to react to what we think should be in such an act, should he get the mandate. So that he'll have to respond rather than us responding to some of the issues that he's trying to address," he said.

The AFN is working hard to force its way into the cockpit before the governance act process leaves the ground because the chiefs don't want the government dictating how they run their affairs. There is concern within the chiefs' organization that the minister is following in the footsteps of so many of his predecessors and acting as if his authority is superior to the chiefs.

In an interview in his office on Jan. 31, Minister Nault told Windspeaker hedsputes any suggestion that the governance act initiative is yet another process where the minister dictates to Native people.

"I would disagree with that comment because it's not coming from the top down. It's not coming just from me," he said. "This is based on consultation that I have had for the last 12 years of my life. People have said what we're doing now is not acceptable. The results that we're getting are based on an act that's completely paternalistic, that's archaic, that's not intended to be a modern type of legislation that will allow us to grow. That's not something that Bob Nault's made up. I've heard this from leaders across the country. And they'll tell me this in conversations like this. Now, for the sake of argument, there will be some who say, "Well, but you're the one who's initiating this." But isn't that what a good minister's supposed to do, I thought. Isn't that the role that they asked me to play, to seize on an opportunity to make things better. "To at least drive the agenda in the direction the people themselves agreed with. So what am I supposed to do?"

He argued that a top-down, authoritarian approach on his part would not resemble the current process.

"I've heard that we should do away with the Indian Act. I don't agree with that. I think we need the Indian Act. I think we need that as a pillar of our relationship. But that doesn't mean we can't improve it and fix it up so it makes more sense in today's world," he said.

"I'm not proposing to scrap the Indian Act. I'm not proposing to assimilate First Nation people. Those days are way behind us and I think people recognize that by Liberal policy. So, I'm not going to do this in isolation. I'm going to do this by working with people and I'm going to do everything in my power to explain the rationale as to why I think it's extremely important and why I think it's dangerous if we do nothing."

Nault said that many of his constituents are Native people and they will make hi pay dearly if he repeats the mistakes of the past.

"I represent the most First Nations of any member of Parliament in Canada. I have more to lose personally as a politician than anybody in the House if I was to move in a direction that was perceived to be paternalistic, top-down," he said. "I have no intentions of putting myself in that position because I like being the member of Parliament for Kenora-Rainy River, I love the job of being a minister. So those who know me will understand this comment that, in fact, I have thought about this long and hard and I just really believe that it's time for us as leaders to take our responsibility and that's to put in a modern governance structure in the interim until people get to a place where they will have the inherent right and there will be self government. It's fine to say you have the inherent right but then in the communities there's, to some extent, way too much chaos. The Indian Act has so many silent parts to it that people are getting caught in the trap of being accused of conflicts of interest. They're being accused of not being accountable. They're being accused of misappropriations of funds. All sorts of accusations that are more political than they are legal."

Coon Come and other Native leaders have heard government officials say "trust me, I'm here to help you" before.

"The government, as you know, in the past has attempted to start or be seen as spearheading something in the interest of First Nations. My issue with that is that a unilateral attempt by the minister to make changes without involving the First Nations will be a failure to start off with. It's imperative that some kind of a process be agreed to to involve the First Nations' national organization. After all, it is the national organization that has worked over the years and knows what changes need to be made. That's what we're trying to do right now, trying to itemize some of that. So I feel that any effort by the minister will lead downapath of being rejected as not acceptable by the First Nations. But I do believe that First Nations want certain changes also. That'll only be determined once he gets the mandate," Coon Come said. "The government will always behave in the way they think they should behave and they've always done that. Not just with the First Nations but to the Canadians as a whole. They always try to ram something down our throats that never involved us and without our consent. That's nothing new. But I believe we have an opportunity here and that's what we're working on."

The national chief sees a lot of opportunities to improve conditions for First Nations people in the next few months. The throne speech made several promises related to improving social conditions on First Nations. Coon Come said he has already met with Health Minister Allan Rock and has meetings scheduled with Finance Minister Paul Martin and Prime Minister Jean Chretien. He wouldn't discuss details of what he will talk about in those meetings but he did say he sees a chance to get the government to look at long outstanding grievances like the housing shortage on reserves and other nagging social ills.

"You can talk about constitutional issues, you can talk about treaty rights, but if you don't deal with bread-and-butter issues, you're not going to go anywhere. Because you can't talk to your people when they're worried about putting a roof over their head or food on the table. They don't want to hear about the Constitution. They don't even want to hear about treaty rights. To them, that's neither here nor there. But if you deal with the day-to-day issues . . . that's what the throne speech was about. I think we have to challenge the government and we have to try to get as much as we can from them and try to present our views without prejudice to our rights and without giving up anything that we have gained thus far," he said.

The chiefs have been here before, Coon Come said, and it was always seen as a