May 23, 2006
website: Peace, order and good government, eh?
For background to the renewed confrontation between local residents of the town of Caledonia, near Brantford in southwestern Ontario, and members of the nearby Six Nations reserve, see "Ipperwash revisited?" from 21 April below.
Yesterday, protestors from the reserve had begun to dismantle a blockade set up to halt construction on the disputed land, in a good-faith response to the province's announcement at last week's end that a moratorium would be called on all building there as long as intergovernmental talks continued.
A group of local residents ("hundreds," according to the CBC) appeared, waving Canadian flags and singing "Oh Canada," apparently meaning to block native access to the town:
The scene turned ugly when a van driven by a Six Nations protester tried to force its way through the locals, prompting a fist fight.Several native and non-native demonstrators were injured in scuffles after natives blocked the highway with the electrical transmission tower taken from a construction site and then used backhoes to tear a shallow trench across the road in front of their blockade.
The non-native blockade began Friday night, as part of a weekly demonstration by members of the community frustrated about the barricade that has been in place for almost five weeks.
One non-native protester denied that residents had made the situation worse by coming out to face the natives.
"We're not provoking the situation," Jeff MacNeil told CBC News early Tuesday.
"We're just treating them the same way they're treating us — refusing them access to various things, like, 'We're not allowed over there? OK, you can't come over here.' "
The Six Nations Solidarity site reports that
Many of the media reports are focusing on racist, inflammatory statements by Caledonia politicians and residents, whipping up fear and portraying a military "solution" as the only option. However, there are dissenting voices within Caledonia.
... and takes us to the Hamilton Spectator:
some residents are furious that their neighbours took measures into their own hands, just as the road was being opened up."There were about 50 of us who came out here this morning," resident Diane McCormac said behind lines of OPP officers yesterday. "We were so excited to walk the road."
She said this time it's Caledonians who are to blame for the escalating situation. "All the people should be standing down to show (the natives) that this can work," McCormac said.
...
Caledonian Jim Smith's voice shook with anger as he spoke about his frustration over the outbreak of violence in his hometown. "It doesn't have to be like this," he said. "We're making it like this. We're neighbours. It's better to get along than fight for years."
Smith said while Caledonians are right to be frustrated, they have to be able to work with natives to rectify the situation.
"They opened their end and we didn't open our end. Now we look bad," he said. "Being barbaric isn't going to solve anything. We have to make up our minds. If we want the road open, we have to bend our back here a little."
There is some support for the solidarity site's summary claim about the emphasis of much msm coverage in two silly online polls being run currently by CTV and the Globe and Mail. Even more disturbing than the extreme alternatives posed by the polls, though, are readers' answers. At CTV, when I last looked, 60 per cent were in favour of using force to end the stand-off; 31 per cent favoured continued negotiations; and 9 per cent favoured "giving in to native demands." At the Globe, in answer to the starker choice between using force or not, 59 per cent favoured force; 41 per cent were opposed.
I will admit that I am not a neutral observer of this or many other aboriginal land-claims disputes in Canada. To me, anyone who has followed the history of a confrontation like the one that led to Dudley George's death at Ipperwash should be wondering about the amazing intransigeance of our federal government, which has for decades off-loaded responsibility for land-claims disputes on to the provinces when it is not the provinces who can solve them and it is not the provinces that the First Nations have their main claims upon.
Some provincial officials seem to have learned from the failures of the past. Former premier David Peterson, brought in as a special mediator last month at Caledonia, seems at least to have brokered an interim agreement, ineffectual and condescending and self-pitying though he was sounding late last week about his engagement with the Six Nations especially:
Mr. Peterson said it reminds him of the dispute between Israelis and Palestinians."It's people talking past each other," he said. "People teach their children a different view of history and a different view of their own rights and there's not a lot of accommodation."
The negotiations have been made more difficult by these cultural dissimilarities, Mr. Peterson said. Like the non-natives in Caledonia, he is used to meetings where representatives stick to written agendas in pursuit of a timetable and make offers to strike a deal.
They don't do it that way at Six Nations. Matters are decided by consensus, which means everything is taken back to everybody -- the clan mothers, the traditional leaders, even the people on the barricades.
Mr. Peterson said the issues change from day to day. One day, he thinks he's making progress but the next day finds that he's taken a step back. "It's an emotional roller coaster," he said.
The poor fellow.
All the same, I take it that Mr Peterson is exerting himself because he, like Premier McGuinty and Aboriginal Affairs Minister David Ramsay understand what "using force" to end this or any other land-claims stand-off would mean and how unthinkable that choice now is, should always have been. Memo to CTV and the Globe and Mail: human rights are not up for a referendum. And might you consider passing that news along to some of the people who vote in your silly polls?
As for Stephen Harper ... But gosh. This is where we left off last time.