This article came from Wawatay News: http://www.wawataynews.ca/
Inside the Metro Toronto Convention Centre on March 6, the bustle of thousands of mining executives drowned out nearly everything but talk of the benefits of mining.
Outside however, in the cold wind on Toronto’s Front Street, a very different message was on display.
Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) councilor Cecilia Begg was telling the national media and everyone else who asked that yes, she was ready to be arrested again for protecting her community’s traditional lands.
KI lands and environment coordinator Stephen Chapman was at the microphone, speaking to the hundreds of KI supporters who had gathered in the cold to wave banners, shout slogans and demand that the government take KI’s concerns seriously.
“If the world is contaminated, where else can we move to?” Chapman asked, to cheers. “We need to realize now, before it is too late, that we are destroying ourselves and our future generations.”
KI’s message was incongruous with the surroundings that the community leaders and elders found themselves. Toronto’s Front Street is in the heart of downtown, lined by skyscrapers, sports stadiums and dwarfed by the massive convention center. And their timing made the message even stranger, considering that across the road was one of the biggest shows of force that the Canadian mining industry has ever held.
Meanwhile, far to the north, KI Chief Donny Morris was riding a skidoo from his community to Sherman Lake to watch for God’s Lake Resources’ promised drilling exploration team.
Morris set up camp at Sherman Lake after releasing a series of Youtube videos informing the police, provincial government and public that his community was preparing to mobilize against God’s Lake.
Morris, of course, was also front and center during KI’s first big battle with a mining company. In 2007 and 2008 the KI 6, including Morris and Begg, made their community a household name across Canada by getting arrested for blocking a mining company from KI traditional lands and spending 68 days in jail.
In the end KI won that struggle in appeals court, and the Ontario government paid out the mining company in question – Platinex – millions of dollars in compensation.
Before heading to Sherman Lake, Morris told Wawatay News that the situation with God’s Lake Resources was going down the same path as the previous dispute with Platinex. The responsibility to alter that path, he said, rested on the provincial government, especially considering the money that the government paid to Platinex last time around.
“It’s happening again – another company is intruding when we are in the land claims process with the provincial government,” Morris said. “And I’m not getting anything positive from (Minister) Bartolucci in regards to him putting a halt to God’s Lake Resources’ activity at Sherman Lake.”
Land withdrawal takes community by surprise
One of the strangest turn of events of the week came on Mar. 4, just days before KI’s rally in Toronto, when the Ontario government announced it was withdrawing a huge parcel of land near KI – over 23,000 square kilometers – from mining exploration.
The move was announced via a press release posted to the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines on a Sunday – generally a slow news day – with little fanfare, no signing ceremony and no contact with the First Nation.
As Morris said the next day, an agreement of that sort should have been treated as the historic event it was. Instead KI was taken off guard, and left wondering why the government had chosen to make an announcement of that magnitude without any First Nation involvement.
“I think they jumped ahead of us,” Morris said of the land withdrawal. “There is a proper way to do these things. There should have been meetings about it. Instead we were not involved.”
A representative from the ministry said the announcement was made after the government tried several times to work with KI on the issue, to no avail.
“In light of the community’s lack of response to our many requests, the ministry withdrew land based on information previously provided by the community,” said Adrian Kupesic, a spokesperson in the office of Northern Development and Mines Minister Rick Bartolucci, in an email response. “KI has continually indicated that they are not receptive to mineral exploration and development at this time, and as Ontario is responsible for managing Crown lands and natural resources of the province, the ministry has withdrawn lands in the vicinity of KI from further mineral staking to prevent further disagreements.”
The land withdrawal was met with tentative praise by environmental groups such as the CPAS Wildlands League. The intent of the move was right, they said, but the fact that it did not address the ongoing situation with God’s Lake Resources means that the current conflict will drag on.
Meanwhile, in Toronto, KI members at the rally expressed their dismay at the government’s lack of recognition of the First Nation’s right to make decisions over its traditional land.
“When we heard the announcement we were really surprised,” Chapman said. “How can somebody give away a land that is not even theirs? That was very unreal to me. KI people have always thought that was our land. How can we be given something that we already own in the first place?”
KI’s message makes it into mining conference
By the time the KI rally on Front Street wrapped up, the crowd had swelled to hundreds. The national media was there, interviewing the KI councilors. And a range of partners had expressed solidarity with the community – including the Ontario Federation of Labour, NDP MPPs from northern Ontario and First Nations people from communities around southern Ontario.
An equally interesting thing was happening inside the Convention Center. KI’s message had seeped in there as well. On the floor of a busy showroom, for example, Neskantaga First Nation Chief Peter Moonias was discussing KI’s struggle in relation to his own community’s agreements with two separate mining companies.
“The companies have to respect the communities, and understand the rights of treaties for First Nations people,” Moonias said. “That’s why these things like KI are happening. If the companies did not work with our community, it would be the same thing as KI.”
Later, in a private boardroom, Prospectors and Developers Association President Glenn Nolan, himself a former northern Ontario First Nation chief, acknowledged KI when talking to Wawatay News on the importance of consultation between industry and communities.
“For the companies to take the time to listen to those communities, and how they want to work with the company, I think leads to positive relationship development,” Nolan said. “Companies have to listen, learn and leverage what they’ve learned from the communities to form effective partnerships.”
For KI councilor Begg, the idea of companies and governments listening to her community is where resolutions to these conflicts has to begin. But as she said, listening cannot only happen when a company hears what it wants to hear.
“We are willing to talk so that the mining industry and the government will understand,” Begg said. “Right now our lands are off limit, because we are trying to prepare our young people and take care of future generations. In the long run hopefully we will gain greater benefits, and I’m not just talking about getting better jobs. In the long run our people will be consulted, and we will have a say.
“Our lands are sacred,” she said. “And because our lands are sacred, we have a right to say what goes on in our country.”