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  • New Year’s Revolutions: Two cases of financial justice for Aboriginal peoples

    2011 is just a month old and already the world is a changed place.

    I refer to dramatic developments in two stories I looked at last year: the fight of Elouise Cobell, and the financial mismanagement trial of 5 men on the Grizzly Bear Head Mosquito First Nation.

    Cobell, you’ll recall, is the Blackfeet warrior who pushed for 15 years to resolve the small matter of how her people got rooked out of billions of dollars earned from resources on their own lands.

    Turns out, despite my moaning about how slow victory comes to those who wait rather than force it, Cobell won:

    “Current estimates project that most Class Members will receive about $1,800, with some Class Members receiving much more depending on the level of activity in their [Individual Indian Money] accounts.”

    Of course, the sum awarded is ridiculously inadequate recompense for the damage done — the lost faith, not to mention the lost interest on the claims over time.  But, by some measure, it symbolizes the ultimate victory of forcing your opponent to admit a wrong was committed.  And, as anyone who’s tried to win such an admission can attest, you just can’t put a dollar figure on that.

    The other “revolution” I’d like to update you on has to do with the story of the men who mismanaged the land acquisition money of the Grizzly Bear Head Mosquito First Nation in Saskatchewan, an act that prompted one band member to declare in court: “We the band will never recover! Because of greed!”

    In this sorry story, Alphonse Moosomin and Eldon Starchief, two of the five men charged, pleaded guilty and were taken away to jail for a year. The pair will also have to pay fines at the end of  it all.

    Unfortunately, the money they must turn in does not equal the money they took out.  But there seems to have been some recognition that they weren’t altogether malicious. They were simply following a well-worn path laid down by others rather than cutting the trail themselves, and therefore deserved a bit of understanding — at least in the court’s eyes. The remaining three defendants go to trial in May of this year.

    So while all is not right with the world quite yet, it sort of feels like the sun shines on your face once in a while.

    [ Images via capitolint.com, smartlemming.com ]

  • Australia’s rates of Aboriginal imprisonment simply staggering

    The numbers are so off the charts I almost wondered whether they’re typos.

    A recent piece in the Sydney Morning Herald puts Australian rates of Aboriginal incarceration at incredible levels. According to Herald columnist Cynthia Banham:

    • Indigenous incarceration rates “are 19 times higher than for the rest of the population”
    • 1 in 5 Indigenous children “has a parent or [caregiver] in jail”
    • “a quarter [or 1 in 4] of all young indigenous men are being processed through the criminal justice system every year”

    These simply staggering stats are embedded in a larger discussion of “rethinking [Australia’s] approach to criminal justice and sentencing.”

    It’s quite remarkable how similar the debate is between the Australian and Canadian contexts, never mind how similar the impacts of ‘get tough on crime’ policies are on their respective Indigenous populations.

    [ Image: Detail of ‘Deaths in custody‘ (1990), © Trevor Nickolls ]

  • Artist hopes to bring controversial paintings of murdered, missing women to Ottawa

    Where decision-makers dwell

    Centretown News reports that embattled artist Pamela Masik, fresh off the abrupt cancellation in Vancouver of her exhibition of paintings of missing/murdered women, may soon seek a more positive reception in the nation’s capital: “As the cornerstone of Canada’s decision-making process, Masik has expressed interest in bringing the show to Ottawa.”

    The CN piece cites Masik’s quote in the National Post: “I want to show it where decisions are made, and then take it international.”

    The cancellation came amid accusations that Masik’s work — a series of 69 paintings entitled ‘the Forgotten’ — “exoticizes” and commodifies the women (many of them Aboriginal). Those criticisms seem to have emerged from mainly Aboriginal sources, though one victim’s family member was notably vocal in actively supporting the artist.

    Regular MEDIA INDIGENA readers will recall that when news of the cancellation first broke, I was immediately reminded of the perennial debate over how prominently non-Aboriginal people should feature within Aboriginal struggles. Critics accuse non-Aboriginal people of making it all about them; advocates say any attention or assistance is worthwhile if it increases overall awareness and support for Indigenous causes.

    Here, no hard and fast rule seems to work. Take the case of director James Cameron, whose work and activism have been frequent subjects for MI. While critics slammed his record-setting blockbuster Avatar as a patronizing, misguided ‘Pocahontas in Space 3-D,’ Cameron has nonetheless leveraged worldwide interest in the film into a potent platform for calling attention to the impacts of the Oil Sands on Indigenous peoples in Alberta. Indeed, near as I can tell, it was at Indigenous peoples’ invitation that he seemed to come on board for the cause. Was it the latter aspect that made all the difference? The debate continues.

  • Métis leaders react swiftly to federal moves to regulate identity

    Barely two days after MEDIA INDIGENA wrote about possible efforts by Indian & Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) to oversee the process of verifying Métis identity, leaders from the affected groups have come out swinging.

    CBC News writes that Manitoba Métis Federation president David Chartrand is “furious” and “determined to fight,” and quotes his description of INAC’s move as effectively “dismantling” decades of work carried out on behalf of his people.

    Now, it’ll be interesting to see what numbers any INAC-driven identity-verification process would ultimately come up with for the overall Métis population. When that day eventually arrives, let’s make sure we compare it to the numbers asserted by organizations like the Métis National Council:

    In September 2002, the Métis people adopted a national definition of Métis for citizenship within the Métis Nation. Based on this definition, it is estimated that there are 350,000 to 400,000 Métis Nation citizens in Canada. The Métis Nation is now in the process of uniformly implementing this definition across the Homeland as well as developing a consistent acceptance process.

    Like everything else, the devil is in the details: put another way, implementation or application is 9/10ths of any definition. This story could only just be heating up methinks.

  • Water expert quits Oil Sands panel, cites lack of Aboriginal members

    A few days ago, we discussed how the government of Alberta overlooked affected Aboriginal communities when deciding on the composition of an advisory panel charged with reviewing conflicting water-monitoring data from the province’s Oil Sands.

    I called it a stunning oversight at the time and it now appears I am not alone in thinking so. The Canadian Press now reports that water expert Helen Ingram has just resigned from that very same panel over “concerns about the lack of aboriginal representatives and how the panel would work.” For its part, the province had this to say:

    “We understand we can’t have representations from every single group, but the idea is this group would go out and engage with First Nation groups within northeastern Alberta.”

    To see which groups are represented, check out the 12-, er, 11-member panel for yourself.