by Smagnis, www.smagnis.com

“Capitalism has infiltrated our communities to the extent that spirituality, culture and our values which identity us as Indigineous Peoples has taken a back seat! Those who try to hold on to our identity are pushed aside by the elite in power married to colonial ways and, as such,whose measurement of success rests in material gain.”

I always pose a question in response to the implementation of Government policies or programs impacting on us. Whose voice is being heard? Is it the urban member who is assimilated and comfortable in the proceeds accruing from being a convenient Indian, the city based Aboriginal groups and organizations supposedly lobbying on our behalf with their own funding interests in mind or the leadership with a selfish mandate and removed from the people they represent? Russ Diabo commented about the AFN General Assembly in Niagara Falls, “At the AFN assembly I observed how the Trudeau government is rolling out its interpretation of the Nation-to-Nation and Reconciliation promises with Indigenous Peoples by using AFN as a partner to help the federal government control and manage the messaging and Federal-First Nation “co-development” policy processes”. Indeed, whose voice is being heard!

We will not achieve reconciliation without a return of our land. There is no doubt that colonialism in Canada was about land. As the great leader Tecumseh said in addressing his people, “The Great Spirit in his wisdom placed you here ...