Cosanna Preston
Freelance
Imagine a community with no running water, where temperatures bottom out below minus 40C and the closest bathroom is an outhouse across the yard, through knee-deep snow.
Imagine a community where a single 900-square foot house is home to three generations with hammocks, couches, and cushions as makeshift beds; where tuberculosis lurks in the close-knit quarters and gas flares light up the windows, outpacing the morning sun.
Imagine a community which sustained itself and its environment for hundreds of years but was swiftly destroyed and degraded in just the first four short years of oil development.
Now realize that this community is in one of the richest provinces of Canada, a praised "First-World" country.
This is the plight of the Lubicon Cree, a First Nation which never signed a treaty with Canada but have still seen their lands and resources expropriated--without consent--for oil and gas exploitation.
There was a glimmer of hope in 1939 when the nation was promised a reserve east of Peace River at Lubicon Lake. The reserve was never delivered.
A further glimmer came in 1988 when then premier Don Getty -- faced with Lubicon blockades and threats of sovereignty -- did convince Chief Bernard Ominayak to negotiate and the Grimshaw Accords were signed.
The agreement set aside 95 square kilometers to serve as the promised reserve, but the Federal government sued; the province did not have the jurisdiction to settle a land claim, it said.
The deal fell apart. And while the province is quick to point out that those 95 square kilometres remain in trust for the Lubicon -- that no new resource exploitation is allowed -- the old exploitation, set up prior to 1986 continues and new exploitation on the remaining 9,905 square kilometres of Lubicon Traditional Territory keeps going with reckless abandon.
Lubicon negotiators estimate roughly $13 billion worth of oil and gas have been extracted from the Lubicon traditional territory.
In stark contrast the Lubicon -- who have not seen a penny -- suffer from staggering poverty, horrendous health conditions and ongoing environmental destruction. They're still waiting for government promises to be delivered.
In light of today's Assembly of First Nations' National Day of Action, perhaps it's time we Albertans take a look in our own backyard.
Indeed, we have a Third World just four hours north of us and our provincial and federal governments allow it to continue, despite rhetoric of oil development for the good of all Albertans.
None of the Lubicon homes have running water. Members of the community presently carpool to purchase bottled water from nearby towns. Wash water is trucked in and stored in barrels. As Lubicon councilor Larry Ominayak once told me, it makes your skin itch and flake when washing. When boiled, an oily scum coats the top. Few dare to actually drink it.
As a first step, the Lubicons want to bring running water into ten elders' homes. However, the federal government will only provide enough funding to purchase sinks and toilets and improve driveways to support water trucks.
Sewage cisterns and the actual transporting of water and sewage -- that would make sinks and toilets useable -- are not accounted for.
Worse still, the government's response has been not only miserly but malicious.
GOVERNMENT VIEWS LUDICROUS
In the March 2007 issue of Alberta Views, unnamed officials from the federal government -- failing to acknowledge neither the Lubicon's desperate efforts to provide the most minimal services for their elders or the government's inadequate response --stated: "(the Chief and Council) have decided strategically that they have a far more effective case in the public eye ... on the basis that they live in Third World conditions with no running water or sewer. Frankly that is by choice."
To suggest that the leadership is willingly withholding water service when the government refuses to provide sufficient funding is not only ludicrous but appalling.
When we actually stop to look in our own backyard, these are the kinds of dealings we find. When someone steps further and confronts the government on its abysmal proposals, the government tries to push us back in our houses and close the blinds.
Some Albertans are no longer satisfied with silence.
National Day of Action events in Edmonton include a march to Canada Place. The Friends of the Lubicon group is holding a mock land grab all day at the legislature with speeches at noon, hoping to turn government logic on its head.
The groups, of course, hope to have an impact but the lasting effect is another question.
After all, governments come and go and the average land claim takes 13 years to negotiate -- the Lubicon claim has lingered in limbo for nearly 70 -- but a restlessness is in the air following recent events such as the Mohawk rail blockades and the release of the Ipperwash report in Ontario.
Perhaps this time it will be different. Perhaps this time the governments will listen. But at the very least, perhaps this time we as Albertans will pause and look within our own province, and realize there is cleaning up to do.
Cosanna Preston is a University of Alberta political science student
© The Edmonton Journal 2007
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