Nishnawbe Aski Nation demands payment of 100 year debt

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Turtle Island Native Network
http://www.turtleisland.org

Citing treaty promises,
NAN demands massive resource revenue sharing payment from Ontario, for "historic swindle"

June 27th, 2012

As one of his last duties as Grand Chief, Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) leader Stan Beardy (now the new AFN regional chief for Ontario) presented the provincial government with an invoice for $127-million "for benefits derived from natural resources extracted from Nishnawbe Aski Nation territories".

However, that is but a small portion of the massive debt owed to NAN by Ontario. "Calculated over 100 years at current day values," NAN says the province owes $32 billion for what a news release described as "an historice swindle" - There are three revenue streams owing to NAN: past due accounts for lost revenues from 1911 to 2011; current annual revenues based on annual resources collected by the Government of Ontario; and future incremental annual revenues based on new resource projects.

From a First Nations perspective, Treaties 5 and 9 meant that all revenues generated from the lands covered by these treaties were to be shared – "there was no surrender involved".

The NAN First Nations have never been given their share, nor has the province ever offered the compensation owing or has offered to sit down with the NAN First Nations Chiefs to negotiate a revenue sharing agreement, "an agreement that is over a century overdue".

As for the figure of $32 Billion, Deputy Grand Chief Les Louttit explained: "The amounts should not be alarming and outrageous but are based on actual present day values. . .Over the course of 100 years since the James Bay Treaty was signed, where we agreed to share the land and its resources, our share of the government of Ontario's revenues collected from resources on our lands amounts to well to over $32 billion."

The NAN news release referred to a recent letter addressed to the federal government from the Ontario Premier asking the Harper government to invest in Ontario - particularly the region known as the Ring of Fire located within NAN territory.

"The Premier suggested a tripartite process but there was no mention of revenue sharing, only vague mentions of jobs and spin-off benefits."

In presenting the invoice to Ontario on Tuesday (June 26th, 2012), NAN was clarifying its expectations of negotiations and agreements on resource revenue-sharing in its territores.

"Before we move forward with any new partnerships, we have some outstanding debts owed to us," said Beardy. . .They have broken the Treaty promises. We owe it to our future generations that we don't have another historic swindle on our hands."