Editorial

Ottawa’s responsibility |

The unprovoked assault by heavily armed Quebec police on Mohawk
ancestral land at Kanesatake on July 11 has brought Canadian-aboriginal
relations to a crossroads. There are now two paths that can be followed: one
that will lead to violence and tragedy, and one that can begin the long overdue
process of peaceful negotiations that can lead, finally, to justice and self-deter-
mination for first nations.

But we must be clear on where the responsibility lies. It is the federal and
Quebec governments, the Quebec police and the town council of Oka who
have chosen the path of confrontation. It is they, ultimately, who created a
situation where unprecedented tragedy was so near.

By sitting on the sidelines and abdicating its historic responsibility to the
first nations, the federal government was an accessory to the crime and,
ultimately, would have been just as responsible as the paramilitary police for
any further loss of life. :

In their greed to make money by expanding a golf course onto Mohawk
land, the town council of Oka bears responsibility, not just for the death of one
police officer, but also for the suffering of the Mohawk people who have
endured the effects of siege and the constant threat of invasion.

By undertaking such a reckless and provocative action as a military assault,
one can only assume that the decision-makers within the Quebec police are
either incredibly stupid or they wanted to “teach the Indians a lesson.” Perhaps
the answer is both.

The burning of Indian effigies at Chateauguay, the racist chants and the
physical assaults on anyone who “looked Native” showed how dangerously
easy it is to fan the flames of racism in Canada. While those who took part in
the demonstrations at the police barricade at the Mercier Bridge are certainly
aminority, it does serve as a sober reminder that South Africa has no monopoly
on racists.

All along, the Mohawk people, and first nations across the country, stressed
that ‘they wanted a non-violent solution to the crisis. Despite being a people
under siege — outgunned and outnumbered and with attempts to cut off their
vital supplies — they acted in the spirit of restraint and the willingness to
compromise. Without that approach the end result could have been a lot
different.

The initial danger may have passed but the wounds will take longer to heal.
The incident at Oka is the consequence of an attitude in which the rights of
first nations are held in contempt. It is a denial of the rights of first nations to
self-determination and until that denial is ended history is doomed to repeat
itself — not as farce but as tragedy.

TFUIBONE

EDITOR
Sean Griffin

ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Dan Keeton

BUSINESS & CIRCULATION MANAGER
Mike Proniuk

GRAPHICS
Angela Kenyon

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ast March, when he filed his report on

the much-heralded opening of the
first McDonald’s in the Soviet Union,
Moscow correspondent Fred Weir noted
that although Soviet workers in the res-
taurant had to conform to the North
American fast food ethic, at least they had
a union, unlike their counterparts in other
countries.

“It is not especially uplifting to see doz-

AA century ago, the coastal trade bet-
ween Chile and Canada opened a

ens of kids, looking just like their Canadian
counterparts, hustling about, mouthing
universal McDonald’s cliches—in Rus-
sian—and flashing artificial McSmiles,”
he wrote. “On the other hand, they do have
the distinction of being the only union
McDonald’s employees in the world ....”

Not quite the only union employees, it
seems. Just last week, the New Zealand
Tribune reported that McDonald’s work-
ers in that country are also covered by
union contract. And the West German food
union NGG recently won a breakthrough
agreement covering fast food workers in
the Federal Republic of Germany.

The new agreement, signed Dec. 20,
1989 following extensive negotiations
with major employers in the fast food in-
dustry, covers some 130,000 workers in the
two market leaders, McDonald’s and
Burger King, as well as some smaller com-
panies.

The agreement covers mainly working
hours, providing fora reduction in working
hours for employees and offering a free
day off with pay for occasional workers
who ear less that DM 470 ($329 Cdn.) a
month. But it shows that even the golden
arches can be breached by union organiza-
tion.

* OK

window on a unique pattern of immigra-
tion, as many Chileans, some of whom
jumped ship from Chilean vessels, settled
in the province. The sprinkling of Spanish
names among coastal longshoremen in
many cases can be traced back to that
early link with Chile, with one generation
following another into the work on the
docks.

Spanish names also appear in Native
communities in the Squamish area, includ-
ing that of Louis Miranda, past chief of
the Squamish band one of whose ancestors
was among a group of Chileans who land-
ed in B.C. in the 1880s and settled in the
Squamish area.

It’s fitting, then, that Chief Miranda will
be on hand to greet a group of youth from
the Mapuche people of Chile when they
arrive here July 26 to take part in a unique
cultural exchange program with Native
youth from British Columbia and Alberta.

Co-ordinated by CoDevelopment Can-
ada, the program will see the Chilean youth
living for six weeks with Native families
in the Merritt area, ranching, logging,
farming and taking part in other band ac-
tivities. For a final two weeks, they’II take
part in courses and seminars at Capilano
College in North Vancouver, as well as a
special conference on Native Perspectives
on Development, to be held at the college
Sept. 21 and 22.

People and Issues

In October, Native students from the
Nicola Valley Institute of Technology in
Merritt and Capilano College will travel to
Chile for a variety of cultural and other
activities in Santiago followed by three
weeks in Temuco in southern Chile to learn
about Mapuche culture.

* Ok

n all the last minute donation-counting
leading up the Tribune’s wind-up ban-
quet, it’s inevitable—although no less un-
fortunate—that some names get missed
in honouring those whose contributions
set the pace for the financial drive. And
so it was with Larry Jackson whose
name was inadvertently left off the list of
500 Club members who donated $500 or
more.
Our apologies to Larry for the omission
and our many thanks to him for his gen-
erous donation.

ok ok
We pass along the following tidbit
offered in the last issue of Mast-
head, the trade journal put out by the
magazine industry.
Apparently, a Soviet business magazine
called Commersant published a special

edition to mark the Gorbachev-Bush sum- |

mit. It wasn’t a familiar title to mostreaders
which was curious since the front page
stated that it had been “published since
1908.” 5

But then a further note cleared up the
mystery. It added: “Suspended from 1917-
1990 for reasons beyond its control.”

OK

irst, there was the famous case of J.V.

Clyne, then a corporate heavyweight,
drinking a glass of water laced with the
herbicide 2-4-D to “prove” that it wasn’t
harmful. Then it was the publicists for the
cigarette manufacturers insisting as rec-
ently as last year, when they were fighting
the legislation restricting cigarette adver-
tising, that there was “no proven link”
between cigarettes and life-threatening
disease. And now we have Ron Woznow,
vice-president of environment for
Fletcher-Challenge, claiming—in an in-
terview in B.C. Report magazine—that
research shows no risk to human health
from dioxins—especially in the minute
quantities detected in pulp mill effluent."

That comment despite the overwhelm-
ing evidence that dioxin is the most toxic
substance known to humankind, that it ac-
cumulates in tissue and that high concen-
trations of dioxin have been found in fish
in Kamloops Lake and the Thompson
River near the Weyerhauser pulp mill in
Kamloops.

Fletcher-Challenge is also the com-
pany, you’ll recall, that fills ad space in
newspapers and magazines touting its
commitment to sound environmental prac-
tices—a commitment that seems to disap-
pear when it comes time to conform to
rigid standards, in this case the proposed
new federal standards on pulp mill dis-
charge.

4 + Pacific Tribune, July 23, 1990