KINGSTON, Ontario – The Ontario government is facing a storm of protest over the jailing of seven aboriginal leaders in a dispute over its licensing of mining exploration.
Six leaders from Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, or Big Trout Lake First Nation – Chief Donny Morris, Deputy Chief Jack MacKay, and councilors Samuel Mckay, Bruce Sakakeep, Darryl Sainnawap and Cecelia Begg – were imprisoned March 17 after Justice Patrick Smith imposed a six-month jail sentence for contempt of court.
In February, Ardoch Algonquin First Nation leader Bob Lovelace was given the same term for the same offense. Justice Douglas Cunningham also imposed fines totaling $50,000 on Lovelace, Ardoch Algonquin Chief Paula Sherman and the non-status First Nation.
Smith refrained from fining KI because the community has been virtually bankrupted by $600,000 in legal fees. The dispute in both cases centers on Ontario’s archaic Mining Act, which fails to provide for constitutionally mandated consultation on aboriginal interests.
On both cases, peaceful protests against exploration resulted in injunctions prohibiting interference with drilling.
”It’s quite appalling,” said an angry Chris Reid, the lawyer who represents both First Nations. Speaking to reporters on the steps of the Kingston courthouse the day after the KI sentencing and just before appearing on Lovelace’s behalf, Reid accused the government of Ontario of being ”in the pockets of the mining industry.”
Referring to claims by Aboriginal Affairs Minister Michael Bryant that he has been trying to negotiate an end to the dispute, Reid said that Bryant put no substantive proposal to the KI leadership.
Bryant didn’t even contact the Ardoch Algonquins until a month after Lovelace was imprisoned with ”a vague unspecified proposal to meet; and the response was, well, that will be tough to do since Ardoch’s chief negotiator is in jail,” Reid said.
There was no response to requests for comment from officials in the offices of Bryant or Premier Dalton McGuinty.
More than 30 groups ranging from Physicians for Global Survival to Canada’s Sierra Club have signed a letter expressing dismay at the injustice being visited on aboriginal people.
”All these charges relate to the non-violent actions of reasonable and concerned people opposed to exploration and mining activities that the provincial government should not have permitted in the first place,” the letter stated.
The groups urge Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty to halt mineral exploration that violates indigenous rights, reform the Mining Act and enter into good-faith negotiations with KI and the Algonquins.
Stan Beardy, Grand Chief of Nishnawbe Aski Nation, which represents 49 northern Ontario First Nations, including KI, immediately broke off talks aimed at smoothing the way for resource exploitation north of the 51st parallel.
”Today’s decision has disrespected and dishonored aboriginal law and custom, seriously jeopardizing any relationship with our treaty partner,” Beardy said March 17.
But lawyer Neal Smitheman said the aboriginal leaders could resolve their problem by agreeing to abide by the injunction and not interfere with drilling. He represents the two small mining exploration companies – Platinex Inc., which believes it has claims to one of the largest platinum deposits in North America on KI territory, and Frontenac Ventures, which is looking for uranium in the 30,000 acres it has staked in Algonquin territory in eastern Ontario.
In Kingston, an anticipated appearance March 18 by Lovelace didn’t happen because Smitheman had failed to request that police bring him to the courtroom from the maximum security institution where he is being held, 130 miles away.
Before a packed courtroom, lawyer Michael Swinwood, intervening on behalf of Algonquin elder William Commanda, compared Lovelace to Mahatma Gandhi. ”Mahatma Gandhi had a colonialist leave through peaceful, nonviolent protest,” he pointed out.
Later, in an interview, Smitheman noted that civil disobedience carries a price. ”Mahatma Gandhi spent time in jail,” he said.
Lovelace was to have been sentenced on a second charge of contempt that, Smitheman admitted in court, might be ”academic” depending on the outcome of an appeal of the first contempt conviction. Frontenac is also seeking substantial costs from Lovelace, two Algonquin nations and several aboriginal individuals.
Those matters will be heard in June.
Charges of contempt against three non-aboriginals involved in the Frontenac dispute were withdrawn, prompting one of them, Frank Morrison, to say his discharge was evidence of ”racism to the nth degree.”
Morrison noted in an interview that the charges were dropped even though he refused to sign any undertaking to abide by the injunction.
”All the Natives go in there and they get pushed up against the wall,” he said. ”I get off scot-free. What’s the difference? I’m white and they’re not.”
The cases of another six non-aboriginals who face possible contempt charges for being on the highway near the drill site March 16 will also be heard in June.
