The tense native occupation near Caledonia is similar on several fronts to the deadly Ipperwash clash in 1995.

SPECIAL REPORT -- STANDOFF IN CALEDONIA: Eerie parallels

John Miner
London Free Press
April 22, 2006

Fifty to 60 OPP officers dispatched in the night to deal with native protesters occupying a piece of land they claim as their own.

A premier vehemently denying he and his government had anything to do with it.

Ipperwash, September 1995?

No. Caledonia, April 2006.

There are striking similarities -- and some profound differences -- between the two events.

There's no doubt the tragic standoff at Ipperwash, during which native protester Dudley George was shot and killed by police, has cast a long shadow over the Caledonia confrontation.

"Has Ipperwash affected the situation here? Most definitely," Haldimand County Mayor Marie Trainer said just hours before police moved in on the protesters early Thursday.

Ed McCarthy, a local lawyer and outspoken critic of the native protesters, agrees.

"That is what is cowering the police from doing anything," he said before the police action.

Parallels between Ipperwash and Caledonia:



At Ipperwash, the beachfront parcel that became the provincial park was part of the land reserved by Chippewa chiefs when they signed over millions of acres to the British Crown, their military ally. It was sold by the band, at the urging of the government-appointed Indian agent, to a Sarnia realtor in the 1920s and later resold to the province. The natives who seized the park in 1995 maintain the treaty guaranteed the land was theirs for all time.

At Caledonia, the land in dispute is part of the land granted to the Iroquois confederacy -- about 10 kilometres on either side of the Grand River. The land was sold by the natives to the government in 1841 with the money from the sale to be invested for the benefit of the Six Nations.

McCarthy, who has researched the land's status for the municipality, says there was either sloppy accounting at the time, or fraud, but the money was never completely accounted for. A large amount of the money was invested by the government in the Grand River Navigation Co., which subsequently went bankrupt.

McCarthy maintains the natives don't have a legal claim -- or even a moral claim -- to the land just because they didn't get the money.

"It is sort of like you giving me power of attorney to sell your house and I sell your house to a third party and don't give you the money. Your claim is against me for misappropriating your money, it isn't against the third party who bought the house. That is the scenario here," he says.

But spokespeople for the natives don't take as fine a legal view of the matter. Their position is the land was stolen and Canada has failed to live up to its treaty obligations.



At Ipperwash, nearby cottagers were critical of the lack of police action to evict the natives from the park. Even the area's MPP at the time, Marcel Beaubien, was vocal about police failing to enforce the law. The day OPP confronted the Ipperwash occupiers, an officer found cottagers preparing to march on the park themselves.

At Caledonia, 500 people turned out to a public meeting demanding police deal with the subdivision occupation.

And there were echoes of Ipperwash in suggestions that natives were receiving special treatment by police.

Said McCarthy: "I am really fed up with the police, they are not enforcing the law. It is very, very frustrating when one group in society gets to break the law and nobody will do anything about it."



At Ipperwash, the park occupation was condemned by elected band chief Tom Bressette, a factor the provincial officials later testified was crucial in their attitude toward the protesters. The elected band council was not recognized by the park occupiers.

At Caledonia, the subdivision occupation didn't initially have the backing of the federally recognized elected band council, but was supported by the hereditary chiefs and clan mothers. Many Six Nations residents don't recognize the legitimacy of the band council because it was imposed by the federal government.



A big problem from a police perspective at the outset of the Ipperwash standoff was their inability to control the park site and keep outsiders from joining the protest. The park was immediately adjacent to the sprawling former army camp the natives had seized earlier.

At Caledonia, the subdivision backs onto the Six Nations reserve, preventing police from containing the area. When protesters were removed in Thursday's early morning raid, other natives moved in from the reserve, driving police out.

A key difference between the two confrontations is that no one has been shot and killed at Caledonia.

Mayor Trainer says police were determined not to have a replay.

"They don't want another Oka or Ipperwash, that is clear from everyone and everybody involved," she says.

And this time, there have been aboriginal police officers involved on the OPP side, a recommendation made at the Ipperwash inquiry.

Included in negotiations has been Insp. Ron George, a cousin of Dudley George, who confronted the OPP commander the night of Dudley's shooting and asked: "Did you at least put a gun into his hands to make it look good?"

There's another similarity between the two occupations.

After police marched on the park occupiers at Ipperwash and made an arrest, they were forced to abandon the area, including a command post, when angry natives joined the protesters.

The park remains in the hands of the occupiers.

At Caledonia, police moved in and arrested 16 protesters, but had to abandon the subdivision when they were confronted by a large group of native protesters.

The occupation continues.