Aboriginal women are leading the Idle No More movement, which activists say is as much about challenging traditional aboriginal leadership as it is about challenging the federal government.Supporters of the month-old national aboriginal movement say that indigenous women’s traditional status as decision makers is part of the reason that First Nations and aboriginal women have had such a prominent role in Idle No More.
Diane Kelly, a First Nations lawyer who was one of four women to challenge Assembly of First Nations National Chief Shawn Atleo in the organization’s election last summer, said that aboriginal women are playing an important part in organizing and advocating for Idle No More.
“We have a very strong voice and I think this is something that’s really brought that voice to the forefront,” said Ms. Kelly, former Grand Chief of the Anishinaabe Nation in Treaty 3 territory. “[T]here’s a lot of educated First Nations and indigenous women that are really moving this and keeping the issues going.”
Indigenous activist Ellen Gabriel, who also challenged Mr. Atleo in last summer’s AFN election, said that it’s not a new trend for women to be on the frontlines of aboriginal movements.
“I think we’re tired of the lack of progress that we have seen, and the role that women have traditionally played in indigenous societies has been one of more equality and decision making. I think that’s what women are seeing,” Ms. Gabriel said in a telephone interview from the Kanehsatake Reserve west of Montreal. “But it’s not a new phenomenon. It’s just the optics right now look like the women are the ones who are leading.”
Ms. Gabriel, a spokesperson for Kanehsatake’s Mohawk community during the 78-day Oka standoff in 1990, said that aboriginal youth have also been an important driver for the movement.
The movement was initially born out of a rally against Bill C-45, the federal government’s 2012 fall budget implementation act, at a Saskatoon community centre in November. Saskatoon-based activists Sheela McLean, Sylvia McAdams, Nina Wilson, and Jessica Gordon are credited with taking the ‘Idle No More’ slogan from a Twitter hashtag to a nationwide movement against a wide range of federal policies affecting First Nations and aboriginal Canadians.
Participants in the movement say Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) government has weakened environmental protection laws without consultation, violated First Nations’ treaty rights, and failed to follow through on commitments made under the United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the January 2012 Crown—First Nations Gathering.
Mi’kmaq lawyer and academic Pam Palmater, who came in second to National Chief Atleo in last July’s AFN election, has emerged as a spokesperson for the movement.
She has accused the federal government of attempting to implement “White Paper” policies aimed at weakening and assimilating native Canadians through multiple pieces of legislation, including budget implementation bills C-38 and C-45; Bill C-27, The First Nations Financial Transparency Act; Bill S-2, The Family Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights Act; Bill S-6, The First Nations Elections Act; and Conservative MP Rob Clarke’s (Desnethé-Missinippi-Churchill River, Sask.) private member’s Bill C-428, An Act to Amend the Indian Act.
Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence, who launched her controversial hunger strike on Ottawa’s Victoria Island on Dec. 11 to coincide with the nationwide launch of Idle No More, has also emerged as a de facto leader to some, while other participants have distanced themselves from leadership by any First Nations chiefs.
“If we’re trying to put a face to Idle No More — ‘who are the leaders?’ — it’s being led by First Nations women,” said Clayton Thomas-Müller, an Ottawa-based campaign organizer for the Indigenous Environmental Network and a participant in Idle No More rallies.
Mr. Thomas-Müller praised the “four sisters from Saskatchewan,” Ms. Palmater, and Chief Spence for their contributions to the movement, but added that the grievances of Canada’s indigenous are too diverse to be represented by a small handful of spokespeople, or even political organizations like the AFN.
“The reality is that these four sisters in Saskatchewan are not qualified to speak on behalf of people living in the tar sands, or the First Nations in B.C. fighting the Enbridge [Northern] Gateway Pipeline, or the people from Barriere Lake Algonquin Nation fighting Quebec and the federal government and the forestry sector over their lands in Algonquin Park,” he said. “You can’t say any one group represents all First Nations in this country. It’s not the AFN, it’s not the Métis National Council, it’s not Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, it’s not the National Native Women’s Association, and it’s definitely not the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples.”
Both Diane Kelly and Ellen Gabriel agreed that Idle No More was not only about challenging federal policies affecting native Canadians, but also challenging political organizations like the AFN to respond to the grassroots that are behind the movement.
“The AFN and other organizations may somehow be losing touch with the grassroots,” Ms. Kelly said following a visit to Victoria Island last week. “I think obviously there’s some tension. You’ve got diverse indigenous people from across this country, so how do you really make the AFN that beacon of power that it could or should be?”
Ms. Gabriel agreed, noting that Idle No More is in part a message to traditional First Nations and aboriginal political leadership.
“There’s more people watching now the behaviour and the kind of advocacy that the Assembly of First Nations has been doing. They want better advocacy, and in a sense they’re putting the leadership on notice [by] saying, ‘This is what people want. You claim to represent us, so you have to put forward the concerns and wishes of the people and not the concerns and wishes of the government’ — which is what’s been happening in the past,” she told The Hill Times.
AFN National Chief Atleo faced challenges not only from the grassroots, but also from fellow chiefs last week as support for meeting with federal officials nearly collapsed when it was announced that Governor General David Johnston would not be in attendance.
Chiefs from Manitoba and Ontario boycotted the Jan. 11 meeting in a show of solidarity with Chief Spence, who refused to meet with the Prime Minister in Governor General David Johnston’s absence.
Grand Chief Derek Nepinak of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs warned that without federal action the Idle No More movement “has the people and the numbers that can bring the Canadian economy to its knees”—a point echoed by Mr. Thomas-Müller.
“What’s going to keep Idle No More active is this government’s inability to relent to democracy, to actually develop policies that are reflective of Canada and Canada’s values, and not just of the base that put them into office,” he said. “I don’t see Friday’s meeting in any way slowing down Idle No More. We’re entering into mid-winter at this point, and summer’s coming. It’s going to be a hot one.”
Both Ms. Kelly and Ms. Gabriel said that the key to keeping the movement’s momentum going was to educate non-aboriginal Canadians and collaborate on challenging the policies of the federal government.
“We’re not a violent people by nature — indigenous or non-indigenous people—so I think we can continue to find avenues where we can work together, but on action items because there’s enough rhetoric,” Ms. Kelly said, adding that it was also time for First Nations to begin asserting inherent and treaty rights and stop looking to governments for permission.
“We just need to gather that confidence, empower ourselves, and just do it,” she said.
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: CHRIS PLECASH
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