[opirgyork] Get on the bus! DAY OF ACTION TO SUPPORT THE ALGONQUINS OF BARRIERE LAKE

[aruna at opirgyork.ca]

DAY OF ACTION TO SUPPORT THE ALGONQUINS OF BARRIERE LAKE

Demand that Canada respect Barriere Lake's traditional government and
trailblazing environmental agreements

MONDAY DECEMBER 13
12 NOON
PARLIAMENT HILL, OTTAWA

www.barrierelakesolidarity.org

::TRANSPORT FROM TORONTO::
For those in Toronto, hop on a free bus to the Ottawa rally!
Leaving 7am from the University of Toronto campus. Returning to Toronto in
the late evening.

**Please arrive 15 minutes early (6:45am). Location details to be announced.

RSVP as soon as possible, and no later than Thursday, December 9th.

TO BOOK A SPOT, email barrierelakesolidaritytoronto at gmail.com with your
name and phone number.

What if a foreign regime was destroying your system of government, so it
could then steal your resources and prevent you from environmentally
protecting your homeland? This is what the Harper Government and federal
bureaucrats are doing to the First Nation of Barriere Lake.

For more than two decades, the Algonquins of Barriere Lake have been
demonstrating environmental leadership to the rest of Canada, campaigning
to stop destructive clear-cut logging and to implement a sustainable
development plan in their homeland in north-western Quebec.

But multi-national forestry corporations and government bureaucrats have
refused to honour any of the agreements signed with Barriere Lake. They
have tried at every turn to undermine the small community, one of the
poorest in the country, and prevent them from implementing and realizing
their vision for the protection and stewardship of the forests.

The David-vs-Goliath story now has a dark new twist: the Conservative
government and bureaucrats in Indian and Northern Affairs Canada are
interfering in Barriere Lake’s internal affairs, using section 74 of the
Indian Act to forcibly assimilate and destroy the community's traditional
government -- a traditional government the community has used for
countless generations and which maintains their hunting way of life and
respect for the environment.

Led by Barriere Lake youth, the overwhelming majority of the community are
struggling to preserve their traditional government, so they can continue
protecting the watersheds, forests, wildlife and lands for all future
generations, Native and non-Native.

The Harper government is violating the Canadian Constitution, which
protects the Aboriginal right to self-government. They are violating the
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous peoples, even
though they have now endorsed it.

Join the Algonquins of Barriere Lake on Parliament Hill as they demand the
Harper government and federal bureaucrats reject the use of section 74 and
respect the community's traditional government and vision for
environmental protection!

For more info: www.barrierelakesolidarity.org

:: BACKGROUND: HOW IS THE GOVERNMENT DESTROYING BARRIERE LAKE'S
TRADITIONAL GOVERNMENT? AND WHY? ::

The government has used an archaic section of the Indian Act – section 74
– to unilaterally impose a different system of government on Barriere
Lake.

Barriere Lake’s traditional government – open to community members who
have connection to the land, and in which Elders guide potential leaders
and safeguard their customs – ensures that community members maintain
their sacred bond to the land and their hunting way of life. The band
council electoral system the Harper government has imposed destroys the
sacred governance bond the community has with the land. By breaking
Barriere Lake's connection to the land, the Canadian and Quebec
governments hope to get away with violating trailblazing environmental
agreements and with illegally clear-cutting in Barriere Lake's traditional
territory.

The overwhelming majority of community members want to protect their
traditional governance system, but the bureaucrats in Indian and Northern
Affairs Canada are spreading the misinformation that they are only a small
group.

Through the summer, the Indian and Northern Affairs Canada bureaucracy ran
an illegal process, imposed by the Quebec police, to bring the new system
into the community. Fewer than a dozen ballots were sent in to nominate
candidates for an Indian Act Chief and Council, who where then seated by
acclamation. Meanwhile, almost 200 community members had signed a
resolution rejecting this process! That represents a majority of community
members who are eligible to participate in their political process.

Even the acclaimed Chief resigned in protest, refusing to break ranks with
the community's majority. But four rogue band councillors with no
community support have been illegally making decisions on behalf of
Barriere Lake ever since. Shuttled to secret meetings with forestry
companies and government officials, these councilors are being used by the
government to derail Barriere Lake's precedent-setting environmental
agreements and to facilitate illegal clear-cut logging.

Youth in the community are leading the movement to protect their
traditional government and to heal and overcome the community divisions
created by the internal meddling of government bureaucrats.

They are demanding the Harper Government cancel the imposition on Barriere
Lake of the section 74 Indian Act band council system and respect their
right to select leaders according to their traditional system of
government.