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First Nations - CF help, protests, solutions, residential schools, etc. (merged)

Lawrence Martin demonstrates in this column that the Liberals and perhaps much of the media knew about but were unwilling to address the issue of mismanagement of resources on many reserves. He then comes very close to accusing the [hated by him] Harper government of deliberately derailing the struggle for aboriginal rights by releasing the results of the audit. The piece from the Globe and Mail is reproduced under the Fair Comment provisions of the Copyright Act.


Another tragic chapter in Canada’s aboriginal saga?

LAWRENCE MARTIN

Special to The Globe and Mail

Published Tuesday, Jan. 08 2013, 7:00 AM EST

Last updated Tuesday, Jan. 08 2013, 7:00 AM EST

Back in the days of Jean Chrétien’s government, I recall talking to a very senior player about the issue of accountability on first nation reserves. The Canadian Alliance was probing the matter, and there were allegations, nothing too specific, about spending abuses. Money disappearing down a black hole, that kind of thing.

Raising it with the Chrétien official, I recall being surprised when he said there was a basis for many of the allegations. It was a potentially a major scandal, he said. So why, I asked, was no one probing it? Too sensitive, he said. “We’d be accused of racism.”

Given the abject conditions faced by native people, it wasn’t an issue the government – or many journalists, for that matter – wished to investigate. It was politically incorrect to go there.

Now with the revelation – did a member of the Harper circle leak the story? – of no documentation for millions spent at Chief Theresa Spence’s Attawapiskat First Nation, the potentially explosive issue is on the table. A broiling controversy on first nations spending, one that could be broadened to include many reserves, would spell disaster. It’s the last thing the first nations need at this time.

It’s a different era. Native people don’t have the ear of the government the way they did before. Mr. Chrétien always had a big place in his heart for them. He was the minister of Indian affairs and northern development in Pierre Trudeau’s government in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He and his wife, Aline, adopted a native son, Michel, at that time. Michel careened from one crisis to another – with the law, with alcohol, with employment. The Chrétiens saw the sorrows first-hand.

In the landmark 1995 budget that broke the back of the huge federal deficit, Mr. Chrétien and his finance minister, Paul Martin, spared one department from the draconian cuts: Indian affairs.

When Mr. Martin became prime minister, first nations were one of his priorities. He negotiated the Kelowna Accord, which provided major new investments for education, housing, health services, clean water and more. Although he was criticized by some as just throwing more money at the problem – the standard Liberal methodology, Conservatives charged – it was Mr. Martin’s pride and joy. To his dismay, one of the first things Stephen Harper’s government did was scrap the accord. But in his post-prime ministerial years, Mr. Martin, who visited the hunger-striking Chief Spence on the weekend, has devoted great amounts of time and energy to aboriginal causes.

The approaches of Mr. Chrétien and Mr. Martin are noted because, if leaders with such sympathies couldn’t make much progress on aboriginal problems, it gives us an idea how intractable those problems are.

Mr. Harper came out of the Reform movement, which was known to take a less compassionate approach. He has been low profile on native issues, a major exception being his emotional 2008 apology for abuses suffered at residential schools. It was the NDP’s Jack Layton who had prodded him on the file, eventually getting his agreement to make the move.

Under the Conservatives, first nations have not been spared budget cuts. They say the cuts have hurt badly. But even if there’s more money and it’s wisely spent, money isn’t the solution to what ails native people. The problems, the controversies – on housing, health care, alcoholism, land claims, resource revenue, resource exploitation – are too many to count.

The Idle No More movement and Chief Spence’s hunger strike have served the purpose of bringing the issues to the forefront with a Conservative government they claim has been hostile to their interests. It’s hoped that a meeting with the Prime Minister on Friday will set a new working agenda for action. If that agenda is compromised or derailed by revelations of a spending scandal on the reserves, another tragic chapter in our aboriginal saga is upon us.
 
Hatchet Man said:
Anyone else catch this part "The key demand of Spence, who has been declining solid food since Dec.11 as a form of protest, ", sifted through the rest of the article and their is only one mention of the phrase "hunger strike".  That's what actually impressed me the most about this article considering its length and its from the CBC.

Perhaps her "Key demand" is that people actually believe she is on a hunger strike.
 
Maybe Chief Spence should be like Puss 'n Boots and go to London and visit the Queen.
 
I don't know if I should have posted this in 'Dumbest things I've heard today thread'  But I figured it was more relevant here.

Chief Theresa Spence's Heroism Already Eclipses Nelson Mandela's
Obert Madondo

Hunger-striking Attawapiskat First Nation Chief Theresa Spence is the reincarnation of Mahatma Ghandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. She is becoming the greatest moral and political leader of our time. In fact, Chief Theresa Spence's courage and sacrifice already eclipses that of South Africa's globally-celebrated anti-apartheid icon, Nelson Mandela.

Mandela came to us pre-packaged. Challenging the narrative of his heroism is mission impossible. Chief Spence's narrative is unveiling right before the world's eyes. It's impossible to embellish.

I met Chief Spence on Parliament Hill on December 11 as she started her hunger protest. I felt an instant a kinship with her. I felt our shared humanity, and our common love for justice for the downtrodden, which spurred me to undertake an 85-day hunger strike protesting the Conservatives' New Jim Crow-style crime Bill C-10 earlier this year. The brief meeting gave me the courage to challenge the hypocrisy and tyranny that accompanies the unadulterated Mandela-worship.

Criticism of Mandela often solicited angry reminders of the brutality and racism of both apartheid South Africa and colonial Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) where I spent the first nine years of my life. African friends often try to silence me with reminders that Madiba is the gift we black Africans gave to the world. Really?

Explain to me the overwhelming presence of white males in Mandela's key moments? British journalist Anthony Sampson helped Mandela craft his famously ringing statement in the 1964 Rivonia sabotage trial. He wrote Mandela's "definitive biography". George Bizos is Mandela's longtime lawyer. In 1993 Mandela jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize with FW de Klerk, South Africa's last white ruler. What remains of the icon if we remove these white males and their self-interested constructions?

Until now, I lacked the courage to publicly say that I never subscribed to the general hagiography surrounding Mandela. I never felt Mandela. I secretly doubted that freedom from apartheid was an ideal he was willing to die for. I doubt that he'd have chosen to go to prison, let alone languish therein for 27 years.

Chief Spence is the essence of a true hero. She's gone where very few dare to go. She's sacrificing her own life to liberate an oppressed people -- and enlighten the rest -- from what former prime minister Paul Martin recently confirmed with his statement: "we were, and still are, a colonial power".

Chief Spence's life is now in serious danger. After five weeks of my hunger strike, my body entered the "starvation mode" -- a critical phase where the body starts mining vital organs for nourishment. The risks include: a) failure of internal organs b) brain damage c) dementia d) hallucinations e) damage to body tissue f) weakening of bones, and g) death.

But Chief Spence is also slowly dying a symbolic death that articulates the Aboriginal experience in Canada. The Supreme Court of Canada recently confirmed that colonialism, displacement, and the residential school system continue to "translate into lower educational attainment, lower incomes, higher unemployment, higher rates of substance abuse and suicide, and ... higher levels of incarceration" for Aboriginal peoples.

A true hero emerges from among the oppressed. Chief Spence is hunger-protesting from a teepee on Victoria Island, right in the middle of the unforgiving Canadian winter. She arrived on the island from a tortured past. She was born into the open prison that is the life of many an Aboriginal in Canada. Like an estimated 150 000 Aboriginals, she lived and survived the genocidal residential school experience. Chief Spence and the Idle No More movement are protesting the Conservative government's final pull at the tightening noose around First Nations.

Mandela arrived on Robben Island, where he spent 18 years, from an aristocratic upbringing in a royal family of South Africa's Xhosa tribe. He and other prisoners were locked up only at night. During the day, they roamed freely. He spent his last few years in comfort at a warden's house at Victor Verster prison. For most of the year, the warm African sun smiles on both prisons.

Mandela liberated many but himself and most of Africa's blacks. Until 2008, he was still on the infamous US terror watch list. I can understand why prisoner Mandela was designated a terrorist. That's what colonial and apartheid regimes called our armed freedom fighters. But I can't bear the image of Mandela, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, first black president of South Africa, international icon and personal friend of former US President Bill Clinton, requiring special certification from the US secretary of state every time he visited the US. Mandela ceased to be a terrorist when American politicians finally felt guilty enough and pressured then President George Bush to sign Bill H.R. 5690, which removed him from the list.

Mandela's failure to challenge his terrorist designation confirms the fact that far too many black Africans still simultaneously adore and fear their former conquerors. It betrays what Mandela himself has described as a "permanent state of inferiority", which inspires hatred and violence, and follows many out of Africa.

As recently as 2012, South Africa's ruling ANC party defended the infamous "kill the Boer" (kill the farmer or white man) song. Recently, Zimbabweans gave up on the fine art of democratic conversation over the thorny issue of land ownership, and resorted to savage racist violence. Fellow Africans in Canada always warn me about the inevitable consequences of challenging Mr. Harper and the Conservatives.

Chief Spence is the epitome of courage. She's publicly challenging Mr. Harper, arguably the most powerful leader in the western world today. She's challenging the Crown to come to the table and discuss the oppressive Canada-First Nations treaty relationship.

Mandela and I never questioned the double standards that underpinned the west's relationship with Robert Mugabe, the genocidal dictator of Zimbabwe, before he became the pariah that he is today. In the early 1980s, Mugabe engaged in a "systematic campaign of terror and repression against the minority Ndebele-speaking people", which killed an estimated ten thousand innocent black villagers. One of the survivors would become my step-mom.

After the massacres, he received honorary degrees from Scotland's Edinburgh University (1984), the University of Massachusetts (1986) and Michigan State University (1990). In 1994, Queen Elizabeth II made Mugabe a Knight Commander of the Order of Bath. The accolades were withdrawn after the violence of 2000-2003, when Mugabe confiscated white-owned farms, and murdered about 300 opposition supporters, about a dozen whites. The Queen annulled Mugabe's knighthood in 2008.

Mandela too eagerly embraced violence. He co-founded Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the military wing of the ANC. During 46 years of apartheid rule, at least 18,000 people died due to violence by MK freedom fighters, the police, the army and rioters.

In his statement made from the dock on April 20, 1964, at the opening of his trial on charges of sabotage in the Supreme Court of South Africa, Mandela explained that he embraced violence "as result of a calm and sober assessment" of the "tyranny, exploitation, and oppression of my people by the whites." He declared that "without violence there would be no way open to the African people to succeed in their struggle against the principle of white supremacy."

First Nations in Canada are living the predicament Mandela articulated. But, from the onset, Chief Spence encouraged peaceful solidarity protests. In fact, a hunger strike itself is a peaceful protest.
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/obert-madondo/chief-theresa-spences-her_b_2408049.html
 
I've said it a couple of times now on Fascebook: I could never understand it when people tried to tell me what being high is like. After reading that waste of space I now do.
 
So let's see.  Now they are minimising Nelson Mandela to prop up Hotel dwelling, solid food striker/failed diet attempt Chief Spence?

I am officially done with this farce.  I really need Walking Dead to return soon so I can get some real drama...
 
This just in. reproduced under the Fair Comment provisions of the Copyright Act.

Chief Theresa Spence pulls out of meeting with Harper.
That's it. Call off the hunger strike, Chief Theresa Spence is refusing to meet with Stephen Harper.
The Attawapiskat First Nations chief, who launched a hunger strike 29 days ago to force the prime minister into a meeting with First Nation leaders, is now refusing to attend that very meeting.
More at link


http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/chief-theresa-spence-pulls-meeting-harper-spokesperson-says-170941464.html
 
Her bluff has been called.  This thing is over.  I hope they crucify her in the media.
 
Crantor said:
Her bluff has been called.  This thing is over.  I hope they crucify her in the media.
I hope her own counsel crucify her she has exposed their cushy jobs and fat bank accounts.
 
Crantor said:
Her bluff has been called.  This thing is over.  I hope they crucify her in the media.

I hope that once the cameras stop rolling, there is a concerned group of Federal Govt. auditors, RCMP, and a very lengthy inquiry into Empress Spence's spending and use of Federal funds.........ok.....and crucify her.....maybe even literally.
 
medicineman said:
We sure this wasn't written for Duffleblog or national Lampoon?

MM

That was my initial thought.  I'm still not sure if  it there was a punchline and was just obscured by overt stupidity.
 
Robert0288 said:
I don't know if I should have posted this in 'Dumbest things I've heard today thread'  But I figured it was more relevant here.

Chief Theresa Spence's Heroism Already Eclipses Nelson Mandela's
Obert Madondo
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/obert-madondo/chief-theresa-spences-her_b_2408049.html

Gee check His bio out:

Obert is the founder and publisher of the Canadian Progressive. Fearless and passionate activist, progressive political blogger, writer, journalist, publisher. Former speechwriter to Margaret Dongo, a former Independent Zimbabwean MP. Former senior international development executive with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, a Germany international development agency, and CAP AIDS, a Canadian charity. Accomplished public speaker.

Published or quoted here: The Huffington Post, CBC News, Ottawa Citizen, The Canadian Progressive, Toronto Sun, Rabble.ca, Metro News, The Charlatan, EMC Kanata, The Dominion, Ground Report, AfricaFiles & New Zimbabwe
Canadian Progressive. Obert is driven by these issues: social justice, equality, progressive politics, immigration, war on drugs, homelessness, criminal justice system, public policy, foreign policy and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

::)
 
She can demand Harper and Johnson dance Gangnam-style, up to the front of her tent on Ottawa's Victoria Island for all it matters now.

Best...One liner..evar.

I hope they do that.  I really do.
 
Chief Spence is now calling for the cancellation of the Friday meeting because the GG will not be there, according to this CTV report reproduced under the Fair Dealings provision of the Copyright Act.


Spence calls for cancellation of First Nations meeting over GG's absence

Published Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2013 11:01AM EST
Last Updated Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2013 1:40PM EST

Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence is calling on the Assembly of First Nations to cancel Friday’s summit with the federal government unless the governor general agrees to attend, CTV News has learned.

Spence says she will not participate in the upcoming First Nations meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper after learning that Governor General David Johnston will not attend the meeting. But she went a step further Wednesday, asking that the AFN outright cancel the meeting due to the vice-regal’s absence.

Spence has become the de facto face of the growing aboriginal rights’ protests – collectively known as Idle No More -- taking place across the country after launching a liquids-only diet nearly a month ago. Spence’s campaign was an effort to secure a face-to-face meeting with both Prime Minister Harper and Johnston, and she earlier said she would continue the hunger strike until the meeting takes place.

Harper announced last week that he would meet with First Nations leaders on Jan. 11 as part of a working meeting co-ordinated by the AFN. However, a spokesperson for the Governor General said Tuesday Johnston wouldn’t attend the meeting, calling into question Spence’s attendance.

“We have sent a letter to Buckingham Palace and requesting that Queen Elizabeth II send forth her representative which is the Governor General of Canada,” said Spence in a statement released Wednesday. “I will not be attending Friday’s meeting with the Prime Minister, as the Governor General’s attendance is integral when discussing inherent and treaty rights,” she said.

It is not clear if Spence will continue her hunger strike, even if the meeting goes ahead as planned Friday.

Spence has kept a low-profile this week after a critical federal audit of finances of her northern Ontario reserve was released Monday. The independent audit – ordered last year by the federal government -- highlighted a lack of documentation for tens of millions of dollars in spending.

“Theresa Spence is really not in the strong position she was in last week, or even earlier this week, before that audit was released,” CTV’s Mercedes Stephenson told CTV News Channel on Wednesday. “It seems that everything has collapsed in from there.”

After the audit was released, a number of journalists were turned away from Spence’s camp on Victoria Island on the Ottawa River.

Spence's spokespeople said the release of the Attawapiskat audit was an attempt to distract the public from the bigger issues at hand.

First Nations leaders are expected to discuss the federal government’s omnibus budget bill and its effect on treaty rights during Friday’s meeting.

Assembly of First Nations National Chief Shawn Atleo is holding a news conference Thursday where he is expected to outline what he hopes to see accomplished at Friday’s highly-publicized meeting.

The press conference was originally planned for Wednesday, but was later postponed.

Meanwhile, a newly-released Angus Reid public opinion poll shows the majority of Canadians don’t believe the upcoming meeting will be successful in improving the relationship between the country’s First Nations peoples and the federal government.

The poll, released Wednesday, showed that 55 per cent of more than 1,000 respondents say the meeting will be ineffective, while 43 per cent found that the relationship between the federal government and Aboriginal Peoples has worsened since 2006.
 
Old Sweat said:
CTV:
...Spence has become the de facto face of the growing aboriginal rights’ protests...
I believe that typo should read ..."de facto farce"...    :nod:
 
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