ALEX DOBROTA
The Globe & Mail
Aug 7, 2006

CALEDONIA -- Brian Sky touches the peak of his baseball cap in a military salute next to a half-dozen red Mohawk flags flapping in the afternoon breeze.

He whispers a few words in the gatekeeper's ear and jumps back into his mud-splattered Jeep for a speedy return to "headquarters."

A Cayuga native and a chef by trade, Mr. Sky directed amateur theatre before the aboriginal standoff flared in the town of Caledonia in Southern Ontario in April. Now, the burly man runs the show on the Douglas Creek Estates -- a disputed construction site where natives under Mr. Sky's command are digging in for a protracted occupation.

"I can't imagine giving up the fight," said Mr. Sky, in charge of "security" for the site. "Our ancestors died by the hundreds for something like this. It's in our blood line that we could do the same."

With negotiations between natives and representatives from both the federal and provincial governments stalled until Aug. 24, when government officials are to return from a two-week vacation, the tension in Caledonia is simmering. On any given day, between five and 50 natives, irate with the slow pace of land-claim talks, gather on the site of the disputed housing project.

Men toting walkie-talkies and driving all-terrain vehicles or SUVs crisscross the muddy expanse.

Of late, the protesters have built a kitchen and a wooden shack to store food. They have turned one of the finished houses into their headquarters. Last week, they used a Bobcat bulldozer to level a parcel of land that had been earmarked for a housing information booth.

Meanwhile, residents of Caledonia, which is southwest of Hamilton, are losing patience with the government's reluctance to dislodge the natives. Some local businesses are losing as much as 30 per cent of sales. Many have started laying off employees, said Haldimand County Mayor Marie Trainer.

One residents' group is planning to resume the weekly protest rallies against the native occupiers. Ken Hewitt, of the Caledonia Citizens Alliance, said another rally is planned but would not divulge the date.

As both sides are growing increasingly polarized, so is the risk of a renewed outburst of violence.

"It could flare up any time," said David Peterson, the former Ontario premier who helped broker the end of a blockade of a major road in Caledonia.

Natives removed the barricades from Highway 6 in May, amid a series of violent confrontations with townspeople. In June, the provincial government signed a $12-million agreement to acquire the disputed land from a private developer and started weekly negotiations with the natives. No violent incidents have been reported since.

But as long as the land-claim issue is not resolved, anything could happen, Mr. Peterson said. "These things are very fragile. It's a very delicate situation."

Negotiators for the federal and provincial governments did not reply to telephone and e-mail requests for interviews. Nor was Ontario Minister for Aboriginal Affairs David Ramsey available for comment. His adviser, Ginette Albert, said there is no fixed timetable for the talks.

"They're just stalling, they're buying time," said Allen MacNaughton, who heads the native negotiating team.

"We're the owners of the land and we haven't been paid our rent," added Wendy Hill, also on that team. "What do we do? "

"We're repossessing," Mr. MacNaughton answered.

The contention stems from a 1784 Crown proclamation -- the Haldimand Proclamation -- that granted members of the Six Nations Reserve a 380,000-hectare swath along the shores of the Grand River. That land now includes the town of Caledonia and the Douglas Creek Estates.

Mr. MacNaughton said natives have been swindled out of their rights and forced to live on the grounds of the reserve. But Ottawa and Queen's Park say the aboriginals gave up the title to the land in a series of agreements.

The natives have filed more than 20 land claims along the Grand River. The outcome of the Douglas Creek Estates standoff could serve as an important precedent, said one lawyer who specializes in aboriginal law. "Everyone -- the courts, politicians -- are afraid to start with the idea that we should give land back to the natives," Murray Klippenstein said.

The confrontation has also laid bare divisions within the Six Nations community. Allegiances there are split between elected officials and a traditional council with members appointed by bloodlines.

Grand Chief David General, who heads the elected council, has called for the protesters to leave the site pending the outcome of negotiations. But Mr. General has neither a place at the negotiations table nor authority over the occupiers, who obey traditional councillors such as Mr. MacNaughton. The protesters, Mr. MacNaughton said, "could be there forever."

That causes great chagrin to Caledonia residents such as Mark Watson, whose backyard borders the disputed land.