Manitoba chief calls for national day of rail blockades
Last Updated: Wednesday, May 23, 2007 | 1:55 PM CT
CBC News
As First Nations leaders at an aboriginal summit in Quebec planned Wednesday for a national day of action, a Manitoba chief said they should instead hold a day of rail blockades.
Manitoba Chief Terry Nelson said blocking trains would send a stronger message about the poverty that aboriginal communities face and the numerous land claims that are still being disputed.
"It's very clear that unless there's significant action — standing between the white man and his money — nobody cares, and that's the reality," Nelson, of the Roseau River First Nation, about 80 kilometres south of Winnipeg, told CBC News on Wednesday.
He and other leaders have been participating in an Assembly of First Nations policy forum, which started Tuesday and ends Wednesday in Gatineau, Que.
The leaders have been discussing the problems facing Canada's aboriginal communities, and planning a national day of action for June 29 to focus attention on their demands for a bigger share of natural resources and power for First Nations.
Nelson has threatened to hold a blockade on June 29 in his community, impeding freight trains filled with goods heading to the United States on Canadian National Railway lines.
He alleges that numerous agreements between his community and the government have been ignored, including a 1996 land entitlement treaty.
It's up to other aboriginal communities to decide whether they also want to hold blockades on June 29, he said.
"I'm not about to tell others what to do. It's up to them," he said.
The blockade will not last longer than a day, he said.
"It's a 24-hour warning, not something we want to drag out."
It wasn't certain that Nelson's proposal would be supported by the other leaders at the summit. Phil Fontaine, the head of the Assembly of First Nations, has always said he prefers peaceful diplomacy over blockades because the latter risk alienating the general public.
Fontaine warned earlier in May that the anger felt in many First Nations communities has reached a breaking point, especially over more than 1,100 outstanding land claims across the country.
Nelson said Wednesday that something needs to be done to encourage the federal government to deal with the land claims, some of which have been supported by the Supreme Court of Canada.
"There's two and a half billion acres of land in Canada and we're certainly not going to give up all our lands and resources and simply live as Canadians and give up everything," Nelson said.
Native protesters have held several high-profile rail blockades in recent years. Among the most recent, Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte in southeastern Ontario blocked CN lines for 30 hours in late April, disrupting passenger and freight trains in the busy Toronto-Montreal corridor.
