Posted Ottawa Citizen
Canwest News Service - He was a sergeant in the Canadian Forces, a longtime native rights activist and was even inducted into the Order of Canada — the highest honour a Canadian can receive.
Still, David Ahenakew, who died in a Saskatchewan hospital Friday night at the age of 76 after a battle with cancer, may best be remembered for the backlash he caused by with comments sympathizing with Nazi Germany’s murder of six million Jews.
Doug Christie, who defended Ahenakew against a high-profile charge of inciting hatred, said Saturday he’ll remember his client as an intelligent man who worked hard to improve the lives of aboriginal people.
“His life should be measured by the tremendous amount of dedication he’s shown to his people,” Christie said. “I will remember him as a courageous and intelligent Native leader.”
The leader’s fall from grace started in December 2002, when he told a health conference in Saskatoon that when he was stationed in Germany, people told him Jews created the Second World War.
After his public remarks, he told a reporter that Hitler “cleaned up a lot of things,” and did the right thing when “he fried six million of those guys.”
The taped interview was broadcast nationally and caused an uproar. Ahenakew responded with a tearful, televised apology and resigned his seat on numerous boards and commissions.
Ahenakew, who also resigned as chairman of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations after he remarks, was convicted of inciting hatred in 2005 — but the conviction was overturned on appeal. A second trial found Ahenakew not guilty.
Christie said Ahenakew should be remembered for more than “one comment in a lifetime.”
After his acquittal, Ahenakew was asked if the experience has changed him.
“I’m still the same guy that was born, that served the world with the army, that served the people,” he said. “I’m still that same guy. I’m too damn old to change.”
Born in 1933 on Sandy Lake Indian Reserve in northern Saskatchewan, Ahenakew joined the army in 1951, after marrying his wife, Grace — with whom he would have three sons and two daughters.
Over the next 16 years, Ahenakew served in Germany and Egypt, and fought for Canada in the Korean War, retiring as a sergeant. He was later awarded for distinguished service and good conduct.
He was elected chief of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations in 1968, and helped establish both the Saskatchewan Indian Cultural College and the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College.
In 1978, Ahenakew received the Order of Canada for his dedication to the advancement of native rights.
He would lose that honour over his remarks about Jews, being told by an Advisory Council in 2005 that his comments had “brought disrepute to the Order."
Ahenakew was elected in 1982 as National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, the lobbying voice for Canada’s status Indians. He helped secure Canadian support for the key aspects of native self-government. He was known as “tough and articulate spokesman” for the AFN.
Still, his three-year term as national chief were tainted by accusations of extravagant trips and expenses, nepotism and questionable contracts worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. While Ahenakew led the assembly, it received about $23 million in federal money, yet by the time of his defeat, the AFN had run up a deficit of more than $3 million.
The assembly ordered a financial review that described spending during Ahenakew’s leadership as "gross mismanagement."
The organization paid for trips for Ahenakew, his wife and others to destinations such as Geneva, Barbados, Panama, San Francisco, Las Vegas and Atlantic City, the review found.
Lawrence Joseph, the former chief of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations. said Saturday that Ahenakew was a champion of rights.
“He became a national leader and continued to be a very vocal . . . warrior of First Nations rights and Canadian human rights,” said Joseph, who knew Ahenakew for more than 40 years.
Although he didn’t want to talk about Ahenakew’s legal troubles, he said it should not overshadow his many accomplishments.
“Those people who know David Ahenakew and the accomplishments and the daring challenges that he met face to face, head-on will never forget those things.”
With files from Laura Stone, Canwest News Service, the Saskatoon StarPhoenix, the Ottawa Citizen and the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations