ese go ro It’s time for a new Indian policy es time Canada adopted new policies toward her Native Indian people, says Doug Wilk- inson, publisher of Indian Time, writing in the current issue un- der his. Native Indian name, Sohaney. He suggests that Native Indian Organizations should unite their forces, seek the support of all progressive organizations con- cerned with their problems and demand a Royal Commission on indian Affairs. “Split effort does not make for success,” he says. Commenting on the failure of the federal government to pro- mote Native Indians to federal posts, Wilkinson notes: “Indian graduates from univer- sity, trade school or other train- ing are only half way, without a job in a chosen field. . . . The Tidian department does not fol- low the policy of employing edu- cated Indians in such positions as agriculturalists on reserves, technical advisers of various kinds, demonstrators in modern meth- ods of home-making and nursing, and so on. “Jobs for Indians remain on a lower level, regardless of quali- _ feations. “The function of the depart- ment is to look after the educat- ed Indian and to educ others, so that in a few years personnel will be available to direct Indian affairs. “Here in- British Columbia I have personally watched a few agents — three that are really conscientious and trusted by our people. “What happened? “One was yanked out of his agency and put behind a desk. Another, who was building a fine agency, new buildings, clean and healthy, was put somewhere else. The other thought Indians were human beings and was rewarded with a severe reprimand. “Time for a change, eh?” sole _ Wilkinson contrasts the plight of a Native Indian mother found . dying by the roadside at Fort St. ' John last May and several simi- i lar instances of Native Indians : dying for want of medical atten- . tien with the efforts made to save the life of a baby by flying ‘a rare type blood, donated by : Native Indians, from Alberta to : California. He quotes a daily press report ‘from Fort St. John, dated May ine 10 this year: “A dying Indian mother sat by -the Alaska Highway for more “than 12 hours, sheltering her six- - tolled past. day old baby as cars and trucks When a truck final- ; ty stopped it was too late. Mrs. Louis Wolf died shortly after ad- mittance to Providence Hospital. “Reports reaching this B.C. town ‘told how she set out on horse- - back from Half Way River. She headed for the highway where, she had been told, she would be able to get a ride for the baby and herself to hospital. “She rode 30 miles and inter- sected the road near Mill 100, where she sat down to wait. “The story of the hours follow- Song, with cars and trucks passing and repassing, and the night pass- ing on to dawn, is the story of death hovering and coming near- - e: and nearer. “All through those hours no ’ car stépped. At eight o’clock in the morning a truck stopped but it was going the wrong way. Twelve hours later, on his way back, the driver saw the woman still there. He took her to a hos- pital where she died shortly after admittance. “Women’s organizations in St. John are demanding an investiga- ion. “There is no doctor in the 250 miles between Fort St. John and Fort Nelson. “Hospital authorities say they were told Mrs. Wolf had been ill, but had refused to go to the hos- pital to have her baby.” Then Wilkinson asks questions: “Did the Indian agent do any- ching? Who was to blame? Just another squaw? No doctor with- in 250 miles — is that fact the answer?” He also. cites a number of deaths at Topley (southeast of Smithers in northern B.C.) be- cause medical attention* was not evailable. “Consider the following Indian these Return to Singapore | By ERIC LAMBERT a 10 years I was back in *% Singapore; 10 years after the ‘iberation from the Japs. The taxi took us through China- town, the unspeakable squalor of Lavender Street, and past the cool. white immensity of Raffles Hotel. Along the palm-lined ‘boule- vard into Mountbatten Road and the way to Katong where I had been quartered in 1945 — frum my bitter recollections a drab, Jap-ravaged village where disease and despair, blackmarket, and jubilation had uncertainly mingled. But when we came by the smooth, new Coast Road (the ditches now free of burnt-out cars and bodies), I found a dif- ferent Katong. : It had seen alteration — not change. The hovels of the Chinese vil- lagers were there still, but thrust back off the road now, as if in shame of their poverty. Now the road was flanked by the modern- istic, candy-colored, plant-decor- ated palaces of Chinese million- aires. ‘ More houses are going up. On a-building site, the build- er’s laborers were young, bare- foot Chinese girls, who giggled when I stopped the taxi to take iheir photo. Good luck to them! They weren’t to know I wasn’t just an- other tourist with a camera, but someone who took the photo for otner reasons; perhaps to show their smiling, sweating faces to the far less attractive hostesses of Toorak. One of them did not giggle. Hér eyes were direct and dark. They weren’t hostile, for all their lack of welcome; rather as if ihey held knowledge that she didn’t expect me to share. Perhaps they were the eyes of Malaya. Perhaps they were ac- cusing me. Perhaps her voice will deaths through illness without any medical help,” he writes: + “Family of Mark Michel: Two-year-old son; another child st birth; mother of Mark Michel. Three deaths in one family. + “Mrs. Duncan Tom. + “Catherine Dennis: Choked to death after hemorrhaging for 10 days on and off. Request was made for a plane to take this In- dian woman to hospital. Answer: Ottawa must give permission to ctarter a plane — she ‘had TB, just a matter of time, anyway.” * By way of contrast, Wilkinson cites the recent incident in which rare blood donated by Canadian Indians saved the life of a baby in California. “RH positive O type — RH negative O type blood in the two parents doomed a three-day-old baby to death,” he reports. “Blood of two Canadian Cree Indian sisters was flown 1200 miles from Edmonton to Red- wood City, California, by jet plane for transfusions that saved the baby’s life. ‘one day accuse her masters who are much like my own masters. I couldn*t even explain to her we hada lot in common. If she and I ever meet in a place like Peking it shall be possible to do 50. « C I had no difficulty in finding the house where my Malayan friends had lived. The house looked much the same. ’ I was hoping with all my heart as I knocked at the door that Alfred, the quiet, powerful boy who had won a decoration — a British decoration — for his fight in the Malayan People’s Libera- tion Army, would open it and I would see his sudden illuminat- ing smile and feel his hard, friendly hand in mine again. But the girl who came was a stranger. No, he didn’t live there any msre. Where had he moved to? She did not know. I felt she was not speaking the truth. Could she not give me any idea? Did she know who might be able to give me infor- mation of his whereabouts? No, nopody! There was fear in her eyes. L had recognized it now. I didn’t press her. I went back down the path, and felt like calling back angrily: “T am not a British policeman.” But instead I got back into the LM SOY ll “At Fort St. John indifference cf passersby took the life of an Indian mother. Here, time and money were given without stint to save a small baby. What a dif- ference!” Calling for an investigation of conditions at Topley, Wilkinson concludes: “The burial service over an In- dian, dead from neglect, is not enough expression of the Chris- tian principles taught in the mis- sion. churches. taxi and disconsolately told the taxi-driver to drive on to Changi. Infamous Changi. Through sev- eral road-blocks where the sol- dier waved us by, over a hill, and we reached the top of a long rise and saw the towering grey walls. Changi like Katong, had altered but not changed. It was still a jail. There was still a guard with a sun in the grey tower. There was, it is true, a lawn in front where it flanks the road. Its huge entrance is now white. I began to take photos of it, then I walked down the hill a iittle where there once stood the rows of palm-front huts where the Australians brought down from the Death Railway to die used to lie and hope for libera- tion as they starved or their com- rades tossed in delirium beside them; from where they could hear one of their number being teaten to death; or see another carried out to have his leg ampu- tuted with instrwments that a butcher back home would not heve used’ to quarter a pig. And the tiny village nearby whose people once brought the Australians food at the risk, and sometimes the loss, of their lives. None of them knew me now. Surely one of them would re- member me. But: I thought that they would no doubt have other things to remember now. I had Hi peer N Ter yyy as, SSS ig iia : : nage Pag LEP og WYfl a> MUU lb 330)! MLE GE 8 PACIFIC TRIBUNE — JULY 29, 1955 — PAV” ‘ x y “Tt is not only the Indian agen it is not only the department) 1 govern ; ment. The Indians th franchise and merit the is expected by any citizen of BY Columbia. é : fy 1200 If a jet plane. can a 403 miles to save one baby, a) © 4). that would probably pay one 1°. tor. for months of practice, were totalled up, why cann? B.C. Indian enjoy medical 4 his times of crisis?” t, the id 10 forgotten this was ten years aie Christian civilization had bee® work again, for a decade. we For all the disappointme? ith: looked at Changi once agai? beer cut bitterness; without ¢0? ion. 00' If ten years ago I had sts there and in my horror a4? yike tress wondered how a thin Changi could be stopped * ow ever happening again, knew. “nord There are _ ghosts. makes them and they come right: you, real as a body in 4 Australian ghosts came erik Changi that morning in liant sun, looking at mee they iarly, and I believe, as } trusted me. ney Which -was surprising — ince have been betrayed so oftel | py 1945. But not by us) 2\jo9- humble people, struggling | qnd ple, people who want eh gght plenty and are not afral for them. ck So I was smiling as I got ba into the taxi. ~ ise Hk Jack, my mate from oe at pressed surprise afterwat — ihis. ; vil Further along near chang us iage a Coca Cola sign ine that civilization a la Americ? luomed over Malaya. e cet That was when I becam” ad tain the ghosts of Chan8! "(ca be iaid. In that time ess, Cola signs would be meamp standing for nothing at 4 ap: That morning, with t car’ proval of Jack, among ne jn 4 ed stone animals I bought ~ shop a white dove. I will give the dove ¢ body, I don’t know who, will be aman like ourse” |. of determined that the & war shall forever be laid ott et © Eric Lambert is the 20' iian two best-selling AUS", oy- war novels, Twenty ver sand. Thieves and The , erans, 9 some: pu