This week, a Cree living on the Pooundmaker Reserve in Saskatchewan, Floyd Favel, wrote an article published in a Toronto-based newspaper calling for "a Buckskin Revolution."
"Within first nations communities, we need a re-evaluation of where we are going as a people and how we can further contribute to this great country."
Favel laments that the aboriginal leadership lives so indulgently, "driving their big trucks and collecting huge salaries." He complains of "unaccountable leadership that administers its people without any rules and leaves no avenues with which to protest unjust leadership."
Yrys said:I think I may have a bit of reading to do...
http://www.bloorstreet.com/200block/sindact.htm
Henderson's Annotated Indian Act
The Indian Act is the main piece of federal legislation governing Status Indians and the Reserve system in Canada.
Annotated with comments by legal scholar Henderson.
The Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador has persuaded Quebec's aboriginal leaders not to organize protests for a day of action designated by its national sister organization.
'The Oka crisis 17 years ago taught us a lot about how something simple can turn into a major confrontation.'— Chief Stephen McGregor, Kitigan Zibi
The national group, the Assembly of First Nations, had named June 29 as a day to draw attention to aboriginal poverty and unresolved land claims. Some aboriginal groups, including the Tyendinaga Mohawk reserve in southeastern Ontario near Kingston, have said they will be holding blockades of highways or railroads.
But Quebec chiefs such as Stephen McGregor, of the Kitigan Zibi Algonquin First Nation near Maniwaki, said they are skipping that type of action at the request of Ghislain Picard, the chief of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador. "We do not want to blockade bridges, we wish to build some," Picard said when he made the request last week, warning that "any attempt of blockade or demonstration of civil disobedience will be severely denounced." On Thursday, McGregor said Quebec aboriginals learned from a violent clash between police and Mohawks in 1990 in which a police officer was killed."The Oka crisis 17 years ago taught us a lot about how something simple can turn into a major confrontation," McGregor said.
The conflict arose after the Mohawks tried to block the expansion of a golf course onto ancestral lands. Since then, McGregor said Quebec chiefs have turned to a different approach. "There is a change of direction I've seen with chiefs in Quebec. They believe in negotiation," he said.
Blockades can be counterproductive: expert
Cynthia Wesley Esquimaux, who teaches aboriginal studies at the University of Toronto, said the day of action is about educating people about aboriginal issues and that will only happen if the actions taken that day don't antagonize the public. "Some of the chiefs are discouraging their young people from blocking roads close to their reserves simply because it creates bad relations and that's not where we want to go," she said.
McGregor said that on Friday, aboriginals from Quebec reserves won't go further than distributing pamphlets at a few key locations, such as Highway 117 north of Maniwaki. If people really want to do something that day, he's encouraging them to go the noon march in Ottawa organized by the Assembly of First Nations, which he says will be properly supervised.
Benny said:On a related issue, our govt has just requested 30 patrols from NorForce (northern surveillance units) to help keep alcohol out of aboriginal communities, to make sure kids go to school and to stop child abuse. An interesting use of the military...
DESERONTO, Ont. (CP) - Armed and angry Mohawk protesters prematurely opened a national Aboriginal day of action, leaving the country's busiest travel corridor eerily barren early today on the first day of one of the season's business travel weekends.
The protesters delivered on threats to seriously snarl transportation in eastern Ontario, effectively having two major highways as well as the CN Rail main line closed. Just before midnight, Ontario Provincial Police said they had closed a stretch of the busy Highway 401 between Shannonville and Marysville in advance of a planned native blockade.
"The highway was closed as a safety measure," said Sgt. Kristine Rae, a spokeswoman for the OPP in Ottawa.
Earlier, about 40 Mohawks parked an old school bus across secondary Highway 2 west of Kingston, forcing a steady stream of traffic and heavy trucks to turn around.
Later, the natives closed the nearby CN Rail main line, using jumper cables to activate crossing barriers before moving another old school bus onto the tracks.
Hours later the OPP issued an arrest warrant for protest leader Shawn Brant on a charge of mischief.
Brant said earlier the barricades would remain until midnight Friday night.
In anticipation of the blockade, Via Rail suspended Friday's passenger train service on the heavily travelled Montreal-Toronto and Ottawa-Toronto corridor. The decision affects an estimated 5,000 passengers.
The OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino warned that criminal activity would not be tolerated.
"We take all disruptions seriously and will use a measured response that must take into consideration the safety of the public, the demonstrators and the police," Fantino said in a statement.
Before police closed the highway, Brant said the next target would be Highway 401, the main east-west artery across southern Ontario.
As a safety precaution, the protesters had planned to wait until the middle of the night, when traffic is lightest, before blockading the heavily travelled highway.
The OPP closure of the highway came as a surprise to the protesters.
"This looks weird, man," said one Mohawk protester as he gazed out over the emptiness.
An OPP news release explaining the closure said motorists travelling westbound to Toronto were being directed to exit at Highway 41 north to Highway 7, west to Highway 37 and then travel south.
Those travelling eastbound to Montreal or Ottawa were being directed to exit at Highway 37 north to Highway 7 and south on Highway 41.
More information on the highway closure were available on the Ontario Ministry of Transportation's website at www.mto.gov.on.ca/english.traveller, the news release said.
The Mohawks' actions were in defiance of native leaders and others who urged peaceful protest on the day of action to raise public awareness of native concerns such as poverty, health, education and land claims.
At the Highway 2 blockade, one angry motorist yelled at some of the younger protesters and a brief exchange of swearing ensued.
Others were more understanding.
A truck driver named Mike was trying to get home to Belleville.
"I don't mind," he said of the blockade. "I just have to get turned around."
A few of the protesters helped guide the big rigs on to a driveway to make the awkward manoeuvre.
Mohawks wearing bandanas over their faces sparked up a bonfire, formed a drumming circle and sang.
Demonstrators are well organized and equipped with a trailer loaded with wooden pallets, large pieces of tree trunk and several trucks.
They are also stocked up with water, food and ice for what Brant says will be an "action of economic disruption" lasting more than 24 hours until midnight Friday.
Men, women and children in army-style fatigues, their hair braided back or shaved in traditional Mohawk style, began arriving at a makeshift camp outside Deseronto just after 5 p.m.
There were reports that dozens of provincial police cruisers assembled in the nearby city of Napanee.
Brant, a 43-year-old militant Mohawk, has done jail time for trashing the offices of politicians. He stands out as the lone voice calling for militancy on what others had hoped would be a day devoted to public education about native issues.
Brant said the protesters were armed and that he and others were prepared to "meet force with force" if police got in their way.
"We've made no secret that we have guns within this camp," he told The Canadian Press in an interview.
"It's our intent to go out and ensure a safe day. Unfortunately, previous incidents have shown that aggressive tactics by the police need to be met with equal resistance by the people that they're bringing those against."
Brant referred to the 1995 death of Dudley George when Ontario Provincial Police tried to force native demonstrators from Ipperwash provincial park.
"Most certainly, they shouldn't challenge us or question our resolve."
Brant says the time to educate Canadians through peaceful rallies has passed.
"We want government to know, and the rest of this country, that we're prepared to make commitments and sacrifices to ensure a safe, healthy environment in which our children can live - and a future that they can look forward to. Maybe then, they'll stop committing suicide."
Ontario Police Chief Julian Fantino singled out Brant at a news conference in Toronto on Thursday, saying he would be held accountable for his actions.
"He is, I think a one -off and we will have to deal with that depending on what Mr. Brant does," Fantino said.
"We're prepared to discuss things with Mr. Brant, we have done that before. But at the end of the day, there is accountability for one's actions as well and he will be held accountable."
In the Maritimes, members of the Mi'kmaq Nation threatened a blockade of the Nova Scotia-New Brunswick boundary on Highway 104.
"It is the sovereign right of the independent Mi'kmaq Nation to disrupt or prevent any transportation through the territory," organizers said in a statement.
Fantino said anarchists distract from the legitimacy of native land claims.
"We can't allow the hijacking of that legitimate cause by those who are intent on creating anarchy or who are intent of creating lawlessness in our country," he said.
The threats of blockades were in stark contrast to calls from aboriginal chiefs who called for peaceful protests and a day of reflection.
"We know there is frustration; we feel it, " Phil Fontaine, chief of the Assembly of First Nations, told a news conference in Ottawa.
"Tomorrow, however, we intend to undertake the educational process, we will be asking all Canadians to learn about our people."
Canada's premiers and territorial leaders also issued a rare joint statement Thursday, acknowledging that aboriginals are understandably disappointed and frustrated with the past, but urged protesters to keep Friday's campaign "peaceful and law-abiding."
The southern Ontario town of Caledonia was also on high alert as a 16-month occupation of a former housing development site continued.
Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said he had spoken to the province's aboriginal leaders, and everyone had agreed the day should go ahead "without incident."
Friday is about grievances aboriginal communities have with the federal government, not the province, he said.
"I remain hopeful that this national day of action will proceed in a peaceful and respectful way," McGuinty said, adding it will be up to provincial police to deal with any blockades or illegal activity.
Marie Trainer, mayor of Haldimand County, which includes the town of Caledonia, said residents had been watching apprehensively over the last few days as cars with Quebec and American licence plates drove onto the occupied site.
Trainer said everyone was hoping the day would go by without any of the violent clashes the occupation has sparked in the past.
"I'm sure there will be a couple of spots that are hot, but I'm hoping ours isn't," Trainer said.
Brant and his Mohawks amassed at a quarry about two kilometres south of Highway 401 that Brant occupied last March.
Brant said he would remain there until the Ontario government stops allowing a private company to truck away the land the Mohawks have claimed.
Negotiations with the federal government have dragged over the last four years, Brant says.
Dale Welsh of Deseronto drives by the occupied quarry, with Mohawk flags snapping in the breeze, a few times a week.
"If everybody would just get together and settle things, we wouldn't have a problem," he said.
People in town are worried about property values and bad headlines, said Welsh, 60.
Then again, he can see the Mohawk point of view.
"I'd be mad if somebody came in and infringed on my land."
-With files from Noor Javed in Toronto