UN Special Rapporteur for Indigenous Peoples Blocked from Visiting Canada – YouTube.
Why is the Harper government blocking entry to this man ?
Métis celebrate historic Supreme Court land ruling – Politics – CBC News.
Canada’s Métis are celebrating a Supreme Court ruling that found the federal government failed to follow through on a promise it made to the Métis people over 140 years ago.
A legal challenge by the Manitoba Métis Federation sought recognition for the treatment of its people after the 1870 government land deal that ended the Red River resistance.
The 6-2 ruling in Canada’s highest court declared that “the Federal Crown failed to implement the land grant provision set out in s.31 of the Manitoba Act, 1870 in accordance with the honour of the Crown.”
The federal government “acted with persistent inattention and failed to act diligently,” the ruling explains, adding that it “could and should have done better.”
“This was not a matter of occasional negligence, but of repeated mistakes and inaction that persisted for more than a decade,” it says.
Writing the reasons for the majority decision, Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin and Justice Andromache Karakatsanis outlined lasting effects of the federal government’s failure to honour obligations dating back 140 years.
“So long as the issue remains outstanding, the goal of reconciliation and constitutional harmony, recognized in s. 35 of the Charter and underlying s. 31 of the Manitoba Act, remains unachieved. The ongoing rift in the national fabric that s. 31 was adopted to cure remains unremedied,” they wrote.
“The unfinished business of reconciliation of the Métis people with Canadian sovereignty is a matter of national and constitutional import,” the ruling says.
Justices Marshall Rothstein and Michael Moldaver dissented from the majority view.
The ruling ends three decades of legal challenges brought by the Métis against the federal government.
Friday’s decision has not ordered any particular remedies, but it could open the door to land claim negotiations or talks toward other forms of compensation from the federal government.
The Métis argued that Ottawa reneged on its promises under the Manitoba Act, which created the province and brought it into Confederation.
The Manitoba Act, made in 1870, promised to set aside 5,565 square kilometres of land for 7,000 children of the Red River Métis. That land includes what is now the city of Winnipeg.
The land transfer to the Métis outlined in the Act was to be a “concrete measure” to reconcile with the Métis community, the ruling agrees, calling its “prompt and equitable implementation… fundamental.”
The land grants were meant to give the Métis a head start in the race for land in the new province, and that meant the grants had to be made while a head start was still possible, the justices wrote. “Everyone concerned understood that a wave of settlement from Europe and Canada to the east would soon sweep over the province.”
The land deal was made in order to settle the Red River resistance, which was fought by Métis struggling to hold onto their land amid growing white settlements.
However, it took 15 years for the lands to be completely distributed, while the Métis faced hostility from large numbers of incoming settlers.
The federal government ultimately distributed the land through a random lottery, destroying the dream of a Métis homeland.
“Section 31 conferred land rights on yet-to-be-identified individuals – the Métis children,” the ruling says. “Yet the record leaves no doubt that it was a promise made to the Métis people collectively, in recognition of their distinct community. The honour of the Crown is thus engaged here.”
In 2010, the Manitoba Court of Appeal upheld a lower court ruling that found the federal government did not violate its duty to the Métis.
The case then went to the Supreme Court of Canada, where lawyers for both sides presented their arguments in December 2011.
The Métis federation requested a declaration that the constitutional agreement was not upheld.
Federal lawyers argued that the case should be thrown out because it is more than a century old. They also said Ottawa didn’t actually violate its side of the agreement.
Manitoba Métis Federation President David Chartrand said the ruling provides the vindication the MMF has been fighting for for years. He said he had been fielding emotional phone calls all morning.
“Such pride at home right now, and tears are being shed. They’re crying and they’re phoning,” Chartrand said.
“They can’t even talk on the phone properly because there’s so much joy at home right now.”
Chartrand said it is now time for the group to sit down and negotiate with the government of Canada. He said they have no interest in land but believes they should be compensated for what they have lost.
“Our country did not give us any kind of credence and respect and felt they just could take whatever they wanted, and today our justice system is saying, ‘No, you can’t. You were wrong. Now fix it,’” said Chartrand.
Winnipegger John Morrisseau is a descendant of the original Red River settlers. He said the ruling not only helps right a historical wrong but makes him optimistic for the future of government-Métis relations.
“It’s kind of put a different turn to it. So now, the government’s going to have to look at us a little different when we go to the table to negotiate,” said Morrisseau.
Chartrand said the negotiations are long overdue and added insight from Louis Riel, who spoke of the relationship between the federal government and the Métis during the Red River resistance.
“He said there were two societies with treaty together. One was small but in its smallness had its rights. The other was great but in its greatness had no greater rights than the rights of the small. You know, how more fitting can that be today?”
Manitoba historian Philippe Mailhot studied the 1870 negotiations between the Métis and the federal government and said he’s pleased with the ruling.
“My reaction is extremely positive because what was said to the delegation from the Red River Settlement in terms of the distribution of land was not what actually happened,” said Mailhot.
Karen Busby, a professor of law at the University of Manitoba, was shocked by the decision, which she says will have major implications.
“This is an absolutely groundbreaking decision,” said Busby.
“The Manitoba Métis Federation and the individual plaintiffs lost on every point at the lower courts, and now, before the Supreme Court of Canada they’ve won on the most important point.”
MP Jean Crowder is the NDP’s aboriginal affairs critic. In a statement issued Friday afternoon, she said it was regrettable the federal government did not negotiate a settlement on the issue before the ruling was handed down.
Crowder said the federal government must now negotiate with the Métis in “good faith.”
Chartrand said after 140 years of waiting, a prompt response from the federal government is necessary.
“I think the onus is on Canada now to do the right thing now, quickly,” he said. “I think this prime minister will sit down with us. It’s my message to him: I’m expecting we should sit down.”
The government of Canada issued a statement Friday saying it is reviewing the ruling.
Everything was possessed of personality, only differing from us in form. knowledge was inherent in all things. The world was a library and its books were the stones, leaves, grass, brooks and the birds and animals that shared, alike with us, the storms and blessings of the earth. We learned to do what only the student of nature ever learns, and that was to feel beauty. We never railed at the storms, the furious winds, and the biting frosts and snows. To do so intensified human futility, so whatever came we just adjusted ourselves, by more effort and energy if necessary, but without complaint.
Observation was certain to have its rewards. Interest, wonder, admiration grew, and the fact was appreciated that life was more than mere human manifestation; it was expressed in a multitude of forms.
The appreciation enriched Lakota existence. Life was vivid and pulsing; nothing was casual and commonplace. The Indian lived – lived in every sense of the word – from his first to his last breath.
The white man does not understand America. He is too far removed from its formative processes. The roots of the tree of his life have not yet grasped the rock and the soil.”
~Chief Luther Standing Bear~
Oglala Sioux ( 1868-1939)
‘You’re all illegal!’ Native American confronts ‘anti-illegal immigration’ protesters – YouTube.
Anger, anger, and frustration.
Watch the silly racists disappear when faced with the truth. Warning: Strong language.
(Part 1) Indigenous Native American Prophecy (Elders Speak part 1) – YouTube.
Knowledge passed from generation to generation.
The fourth world shall end soon, and the fifth world will begin. This the elders everywhere know.”
We are told of the coming of the white- skinned men, like Pahana, but not living like Pahana. Men who took the land that was not theirs. And men who struck their enemies with thunder.
A strange beast like a buffalo, but with great long horns, will overrun the land in large numbers.
The land will be crossed with snakes of iron.”
The land shall be criss-crossed by a giant spider’s web.
The land shall be criss-crossed with rivers of stone that make pictures of the sun.
You will hear of the sea turning black, and many living things dying because of it.
You will see many youth, who wear their hair long like my people, come to join tribal nations, to learn their ways of wisdom.
You will hear of a dwelling-place in the heavens, above the earth, that shall fall with great crash. It will appear as a blue star. Very soon after this, the ceremonies of my people will cease. These are the signs that great destruction is coming. The world shall rock to and from. The white man will against other people in other lands_with those who possessed the first light of wisdom.
From Wiki:
The Nibiru cataclysm is a supposed disastrous encounter between the Earth and a large planetary object (either a collision or a near-miss) which certain groups believe will take place in the early 21st century. Believers in this doomsday event usually refer to this object as Planet X or Nibiru. The idea that a planet-sized object could collide with or pass by Earth in the near future is not supported by any scientific evidence and has been rejected as pseudoscience by astronomers and planetary scientists.[1]
The idea was first put forward in 1995 by Nancy Lieder, founder of the website ZetaTalk. Lieder describes herself as a contactee with the ability to receive messages from extra-terrestrials from the Zeta Reticuli star system through an implant in her brain. She states that she was chosen to warn mankind that the object would sweep through the inner Solar System in May 2003 (though that date was later abandoned) causing Earth to undergo a pole shift that would destroy most of humanity. The prediction has subsequently spread beyond Lieder’s website and has been embraced by numerous Internet doomsday groups, most of which link the event to the 2012 phenomenon. Although the name “Nibiru” is derived from the works of the late ancient astronaut writer Zecharia Sitchin and his interpretations of Babylonian and Sumerian mythology, Sitchin denied any connection between his work and various claims of a coming apocalypse.
I need your strength and wisdom.
Let me walk in beauty and make my eyes ever behold the red and purple sunset.
Make my hands respect the things you have
made and my ears sharp to hear your voice.
Make me wise so that I may understand the things you have taught my people.
Let me learn the lessons you have
hidden in every leaf and rock.
I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother, but to fight my greatest enemy – myself.
Make me always ready to come to you
with clean hands and straight eyes.
So when life fades, as the fading sunset,
my Spirit may come to you without shame.
~ Chief Yellow Lark, 1887 ~
Oren Lyons – “We Are Part of the Earth” – YouTube.
Oren Lyons, a Native American Faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan, and a member of the Onondoga Nation Council of Chiefs of the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy (the Haudenosaunee), recites the poignant story of how after graduating college he was reminded of the importance of his connection to the Earth by his uncle and Council Chief.
In this beautiful story, Oren is reminded of the similarities between men and trees, and is hit hard with the realization that the most important wisdom often reflects the simplest and most basic concepts about the nature of life.
Please enjoy and share this inspiring tale with you friends and loved ones.
