Eden Robinson, writing in The Globe and Mail:
The First Nations Financial Transparency Act insulted the integrity of the very people in our communities who guide our economic policy and act as our mediators with provincial and federal governments. Every single chief councilor and band councillor up and down the coast was publicly forced last week to prove they aren’t liars and cheats. In the potlatch culture, that’s the equivalent of spitting in the communal dish then demanding to sleep with the chief’s daughter.
Hmm. In white-man culture, hiding taxpayers’ money is the equivalent of larceny and fraud. Perhaps we can find the middle grou…
I’m not familiar with the many aspects of federal negotiation tactics, but let me assure you, this act makes building any pipeline or promising to send tankers through our territories much, much harder.
There’s the middle ground.
just cut off funds till credible audit arrives
“my people”
MY MONEY!
just cut off funds — (FIFY)
You do not want to be subject to audits?
Stop accepting government funding. If you use your own money, you can do as you please. If you use government funding, you accept the rules and restrictions.
Don’t like it, ask your progressive buddies to finance you with their own personal money.
Exactly. No audits, no more funding. Let them run their reserves on charitable donations.
“Spitting in the potlatch dish…” Is that the same one they put next to the bodies of the slaves whose skulls they just bashed in to show how wealthy and powerful they are? Pfffttt!!!
The comments are entertaining and mostly very simple; Don’t like accountability rules?
Don’t take taxpayer funds.
“Every single chief councilor and band councillor up and down the coast was publicly forced last week to prove they aren’t liars and cheats.” Robinson
What a Moron, I get to file 2(two)USA & Canada income tax returns each year, it’s called a privilege. That Indian is living in a childish dream!
Time to abolish the Indian Act!
“…Robinson, who changed her given name from Vicki Lena to Eden during her first year at university, earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the University of Victoria. She then completed a Masters in Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia. After many years of travel and city life, Robinson returned to Kitamaat Reserve in 2003. Eden Robinson counts Stephen King and Edgar Allan Poe amongst her literary influences, and she has won national and international acclaim for her dark, gothic fiction. …”
Dark, gothic fiction indeed. I just wish this account of her life had not neglected how she independently worked her way through University – you know, dishes, waitressing, etc.
“weapon of last resort.
On the other hand, our elected chief councilors and band councilors tend to be people who value economic self-sufficiency. They’re usually highly educated and pro-development.
What color do you think the sky is in her parallel universe is?
“What color do you think the sky is in her parallel universe is?”
Good question.I have known residents of many reserves,most said nepotism and looking out for their own family to the detriment of the rest of the Band is the standard operating procedure of the Chiefs.
The author,Robinson, must know her own people,the Heiltsuks, used to raid the weaker tribes on the coast,and took captives to be used as slaves. So much for the moral high ground.
Her huffy outrage at the offence to “her people’s dignity”,and the thinly veiled threat of more blackmail before we can build the pipelines, doesn’t sit well with we Canadian taxpayers who paid her way her entire life.
I see they’ve gone to the HAMAS school of winning friends and influencing people.
Western Leaders are servants of the people (i.e. the taxpayers). Any good servant shouldn’t be ashamed to demonstrate the service they give is good value for their remuneration. Since Chiefs accept taxpayer money as remuneration they are defacto servants accountable not only to their band but also the source of their funding…that is everyone else in Canada.
Oh the wonders of identity politics. Just tell this young lady the color of your skin and she will be pleased to dispense how much “respect” you deserve. Public audits and public information on white politicians at all levels, available to the public – just a normal part of representative govt. However, it is “disrespectful” to hold Native politicians to exactly the same standards and requirement, they must be give a much higher level of “respect” or is it privilege?
Remember the definition of Racism – to make assumptions or judgements based on race or the belief that that there are fundamental differences in virtue, ability or character that can be identified merely by referring to the person’s race.
So the question. Does her race entitle her to dictate to everyone else native and white alike, what level of race based “respect” a persons race entitles them?
These poor unfortunates should flee this country and start their own Nation!
Run rabbit run, we’re routin for ya…………..
I guess that Prime Minister Harper has been put on notice; from now on it’s going to be burial grounds as far as the eye can see.
“Every single chief councilor and band councillor up and down the coast was publicly forced last week to prove they aren’t liars and cheats.”
And one of those chiefs (Ron Geischert of Kwekwitlem Nation in Coquitlam) was awarded an $800,000 bonus on an $85,000 salary when the bands assets are $8.8M. A bonus that is nine terms his salary and 9% of the bands assets? If you don’t find that a little sketchy you need to wake up and smell the coffee.
I know! They can show whitey what-for by sending back his dirty, dirty money!
What a spirited and wordy defense of corruption.
A dozen or so years ago, I was involved in the treaty negotiation process on Northern Vancouver Island. I recall a meeting with fellow treaty advisory members from local governments (we were part of the various provincial teams) and a presentation given describing the process as less like a reconciliation and more like a divorce with the negotiations revolving around the divvying up of assets. This reinforced the power of the tribal governance while acting as a disincentive to assimilate with the rest of Canada which is the only way it (apartheid) will ever end.
The legal community, political class, and most all the other white (inclusive of all non-native races) pimps associated with the Indian Industry were/are mostly afflicted with Stockholm Syndrome. I had to sit through multiple meetings where each band’s negotiator had to rephrase each others objections (seven bands)to allowing someone from local government to sit with the provincial negotiators. IOWs, they wanted to dictate to the Province who they were allowed to bring to the table with whom they would negotiate. People from neighboring towns who actually familiar many of them were, apparently not particularly welcome. The federal government was there and they were delighted that BC was stupid enough to have jumped into what was, prior to NDP involvement, a federal responsibility. The province owned the land and resources and should have stayed out of it, telling the feds to bring money when they want to talk about land.
Yes ma’am. Robinson is GTA-ing with a public-sector union accent, and her intended audience is the people in the whitey-system who pay out. I really don’t believe she’s speaking to, or for, the non-moneytrain-connected people who live isolated on reserves, I think she’s wielding that effective aboriginal talisman on behalf of the chiefs while playing white-man politics.
This is not a potlatch nor is it a potlatch culture, in case she hadn’t noticed.
Crooked members of the First Nations oligarchy
bear a striking resemblance to Liberal movers
and shakers. Guess that is why the subject is
so sensitive.
I support full sovereignty for Aboriginals to govern themselves as they see fit.
And if they want to use our hospitals, schools, roads, electricity and the rest they can pay the market price.
memo to all Indians. the people of Canada pay you to do nothing. the government and the people of Canada will use what you call your land in the best interests of all Canadians when necessary. now get up and get productive and pay Canada back.
Take “heart folks”…. There lies in OSOYOOS BC a First Nations Band led by Chief Clarence Louie.
Unless or until every FIRST NATIONS BAND in Canada emulates the Clarence Louie led Band in self sufficiency, the dependency model will remain and the current model of Band corruption will continue, to the detriment of ALL!
OH YES, AND BLOCKING PIPELINES OR RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT …………..IS NOT SELF SUFFICIENCY!
Thieves hate it when you buy a guard dog and install better locks. “Restraint of trade” they call it.
I thought the big demand for disclosure of band finances came from the membership, eager to know how badly they are being screwed. The prime user of financial information is the reserve member. Because all members are entitled to an audited financial statement, whitey gets to see it too.
I remember back in my youth when every household got a copy of the county financial statement. The first thing my father did was check how much money our counselor was paid. For some reason these don’t seem to be sent in the mail anymore. I think you have to go ask for one.
Norm “This is not a potlatch nor is it a potlatch culture, in case she hadn’t noticed.”
Perhaps you might want to come to Alberta and explain why all the Bush Indians have adopted plains culture when they play Indian. I suspect a lot of what they believe is traditional culture was gleaned from old dusters or at least it appears that way.
Yeah right:
http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/08/12/kwikwetlem-chief-got-massive-sallary-in-part-by-abandoning-landclaim-and-taking-10-of-8m-payout/
BTW, I`m not happy about disclosing my income to CRA just to prove I`m not a cheat!!!
Scar,if you ever come across an old book by Pierre Berton called “Hollywood’s Canada”, take it home and read it.It’s full of funny stuff about Canada in general and Indians as perceived by Hollywood in the 1920’s and 30’s.
The local Indians love to perform the sacred “sundance ceremony”, which was a ceremony of the Arizona and New Mexico Indians,and they all just love to wear the big eagle feather headdress, just like the Hollywood Indians always did in the movies.
I find it odd that so many “Indians” look down their nose at Metis, yet most Indians have no more Indian blood than many of the Metis.
Racism and discrimination are very much part of the First Nations traditions,but they’re too busy bitching at the white man to ever discuss that nasty fact.
There is only one word between the lines in that stupid woman’s article: BLACKMAIL
Joe you put Louie on much too high a pedestal. He too is complaining about the new rules, just like the rest of them.
When you consider how much money taxpayers have shovelled to these bands over the years, and that includes Louis’ band, we have every right to know what they are making, from all sources.
My hunch has always been that Louie is far from the saint everyone seems to think he is.
A Masters in Creative Writing, how appropriate. Not the quality, but the “creative” part is obvious. “National and international acclaim” – yeah right, if you read the kind of incestuous clannish critical journals dedicated to complete unknowns like her. What utter freakin’ nonsense. And a big +1 on all the other comments here, especially Chip’s regarding paying market price.
Chip, I’m with you on that. But the problem is that here in BC the SOBs claim they own the whole province, and then some.
And so it begins folks:
http://www.vancouversun.com/touch/business/First+Nations+band+evicts+company+that+owns+Mount+Polley/10114383/story.html?rel=813152
Those utter fools that comprise our Supreme Court have put BC on the path to chaos.
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“one of those chiefs (Ron Geischert of Kwekwitlem Nation in Coquitlam) was awarded an $800,000 bonus”
which, just in case anybody is wondering, is tax free income… which would actually be 1.6 million pre-tax dollars in the wiley white man’s world.
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B C ………………… WE DISAGREE IN REGARD TO CLARENCE LOUIE
Attawapiskat chief Theresa of the phoney hunger strike gave herself an 18% raise a short time ago.