Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs won't talk with Trudeau and Horgan until Mounties leave
Credit to Author: David Carrigg| Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2020 05:28:13 +0000
Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs have refused an offer to meet with cabinet ministers from the federal and provincial governments until the RCMP leave the Morice Forest Service Road.
On Sunday, Scott Fraser, B.C.’s Minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation, and Carolyn Bennett, federal Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, sent a letter to Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs asking to meet as soon as possible to “talk about finding a peaceful resolution to the blockades across the country and other issues arising from the concerns of Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs.”
However, on Tuesday afternoon Chief Woos of the Grizzly House said all hereditary chiefs agreed they would not meet with government until the RCMP removed their mobile command unit across the bridge from the Unist’ot’en camp on the forest road that links Houston to a Coastal GasLink work camp.
Wet’suwet’en hereditary Chief Woos said his fellow hereditary chiefs won’t talk with the government until the RCMP leaves their land #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/3Sed2bDdDQ
Chief Smogelgem, of the Sun House, went a step further saying chiefs also wanted all Coastal GasLink permits pulled before they would meet.
We have NOT MET with @Carolyn_Bennett or with @scottfraserndp. We will not talk to them until the RCMP are out of our lands and until CGL permits are pulled and they adhere to our eviction notice. https://t.co/ELnKakxYHP
Staff Sergeant Janelle Shoihet said the RCMP were aware of the chief’s request “to remove a mobile policing unit from an area in northern British Columbia where they enforced an injunction against pipeline opponents this month.”
She said discussions were underway with all stakeholders.
An emergency debate was also held in the House of Commons on Tuesday night to consider the Wet’suwet’en blockades. According to Vancouver East MP Jenny Kwan, who was at the debate, Bennett told the house she would not agree to asking the RCMP to leave the forest service road. Given Bennett is in Ottawa, it is unlikely she would be available for a meeting called at short notice.
The latest drama in the continuing anti-pipeline crisis came as a meeting was called for Wednesday afternoon in Houston B.C. to hear from Wet’suwet’en members who are in favour of the Coastal GasLink pipeline.
“This event is meant to be a safe place for people who support the project to be heard,” said organizer Steve Simon, who is a Victoria-based resource advocate working with the Kitimat-based group The North Matters. The event starts at 2 p.m. at the Pleasant Valley Plaza Theatre.
Simon said that six speakers had promised to show up, but he would not name them because he claimed they would be subject to threats from other Wet’suwet’en members.
“The situation in the past few weeks has blown out of control across the nation,” Simon said.
A couple of hundred protesters took part in a rally in support of the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs at the Manitoba Legislature on Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2020. Josh Aldrich/Winnipeg Sun/Postmedia
What started as a localized protest by Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs opposed to the natural gas pipeline being laid through Wet’suwet’en territory has turned into a Canada-wide protest, with a wide-range of activists blocking roads, railways and access to government buildings.
At its root is a divide between Wet’suwet’en members who want an estimated $250 million in benefits that Coastal GasLink has offered five elected Wet’suwet’en bands, and those supporting the Wet’suwet’en’s 10 hereditary chiefs who are opposed. The bands that have signed access and benefits deals are the Witset, Wet’suwet’en, Skin Tyee, Nee-Tahi-Buhn and the Ts’il Kaz Koh (Burns Lake Band). The only Wet’suwet’en band not to sign is the Hagwilget, in the northernmost part of the nation’s 22,000 square kilometre territory.
The umbrella organization for the Wet’suwet’en First Nation is the Office of the Wet’suwet’en, that is governed by representatives from the nation’s five clans and five elected bands, though the balance of power is weighted in favour of the clans that have 13 hereditary house chiefs (though three of those positions are vacant.)
The hereditary chiefs claim responsibility for all the nation’s territory, while the bands are responsible primarily for the small reserve lands apportioned to them by the federal government.
An example of the divide between band and hereditary clan/house is the election of the Witset band council (the largest of the bands) last year.
Recently-appointed hereditary chief for the Sun House, Warner Naziel — known as Smogelgem — and Freda Huson, a wing chief for Dark House, attempted to get elected on an anti-pipeline ticket and failed. They are now key players in the continuing protest. Huson was a two-time elected councillor.
The most active houses in the pipeline dispute are Dark House (Big Frog Clan), Grizzly House (Wolf and Bear Clan) and Sun House (Fireweed and Owl Clan.)
According to a 2018 affidavit signed by former Coastal GasLink Indigenous services consultant Claire Marshall, B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office set out which Indigenous groups needed to be consulted about the pipeline. However, the Calgary-based company also sought out other Indigenous groups and in the summer of 2012 had its first meetings with the Office of the Wet’suwet’en, and in 2015 began meeting directly with hereditary chiefs.
Marshall said Coastal GasLink met with three female chiefs: Theresa Tait-Day (House Beside the Fire), Darlene Glaim (Grizzly House) and Gloria George (Sun House). Those women went on to form the Wet’suwet’en Matrilineal Coalition, in a bid to come to an agreement with Coastal GasLink.
Since then, all three women have been deposed and replaced by anti-pipeline chiefs.
Marshall wrote that Coastal GasLink had 120 in-person meetings with the Office of the Wet’suwet’en or hereditary chiefs, but dealt with Freda Huson from Dark House separately. She wrote that Dark House refused “capacity funding” from the company.
Huson also repeatedly refused various overtures from Coastal GasLink, stating she was not interested at all in any pipeline being built through Wet’suwet’en territory.
Huson was arrested two weeks ago when the RCMP, acting on a court order in favour of Coastal GasLink, broke through a barricade at the Unist’ot’en Camp on the Morice Forest Service Road southeast of Houston. This was the final blockade preventing workers from accessing a camp. Those workers, including at least two dozen Wet’suwet’en, are now living in the camp and clearing a path for the underground pipeline east toward Kitimat, where the LNG Canada plant is being built.
Meanwhile, business groups are calling on the federal government to take steps to immediately restore disrupted rail service.
Dennis Darby, chief executive officer of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, said the situation is “beyond serious.”
The group estimates that goods worth about $425 million were being stranded every day the blockade continues.
Darby said it would take three to four days of work to recover from a single day of disruption.
His message was underscored by Maple Leaf Foods president Curtis Frank, who said Canada exported 60 per cent of its pork products and needed an urgent government response to resolve rail blockades.
with files from Canadian Press