The most pressing question on this year's National Truth and Reconciliation Day is not where to go surfing, but what are the best words to describe what the Trudeau Liberals are currently doing to the indigenous people..On the one hand, Trudeau pontificates about the need for reconciliation. But on the other, he causes Parliament to pass the Impact Assessment Act (IAA). This has the effect of taking away the right of the indigenous people to self-sovereignty as it relates to resource extraction from their lands. It instead gives the federal executive (Trudeau, personally) that decision-making power..This's particularly egregious as it relates to the First People of the Prairies for two reasons. First, much of the opportunity for wealth creation on reserve lands relates directly and often solely, to the extraction of natural resources. The IAA effectively transfers that asset to the federal cabinet..Second, the treaties, which are the foundational agreements of the entirety of the prairie provinces (100% of the land), assured full economic participation to the indigenous people and set aside certain lands upon which their culture could be maintained. Self-sovereignty, particularly as it relates to land usage, is a cornerstone of their traditional culture. The Liberals are taking that right away..Undoubtedly the Liberals are being deceptive, but what are the best words to describe their beguilement?.Boxing terminology would call it “showing the left and then delivering the knock out blow with the right.” That describes it, in part..All the big cash settlements and even creating a day of reconciliation would imply Trudeau cares about the indigenous peoples. But the knockout blow is the IAA makes them economic wards of the whims of the federal executive. The act is even more impactful because it takes away a foundational aspect of their culture, self-sovereignty..Perhaps it is just a continuation of the same old cultural genocide that Trudeau himself admits the government did in the past. It is really hard to solemnly apologize for something and then just keep doing it. Authenticity withers..Some might say Trudeau is gaslighting the indigenous people. Indigenous voices against resource development are amplified while the community’s pro-prosperity, pro-development voices are muted. That leaves the impression Trudeau’s government is coming to their rescue at their request. He's taking away their right of prosperity and self determination while implying he's saving the indigenous from themselves. This description may fit, but I’m not exactly sure what gaslighting is..The best description though, is the government simply re-colonizing the indigenous. The federal executive is taking back the rights and opportunities that were promised to the indigenous by treaty and later, by the Constitution. Trudeau’s government is simply duplicitous. It pretends to accommodate, but silently, innocuously strikes a cultural death blow..What should this day of reconciliation really be about, then? It should be about the non-indigenous of the prairies, those of us who live on these lands at the invitation of treaties, standing up against the federal government’s re-colonization. Perhaps our forefathers didn’t stand up in the past when we should have. But we must now..Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba should all introduce Sovereignty Acts to stop the calamity that's being visited upon the very community that invited us to live here. As much as the Sovereignty Act is purported to stop federal incursion into provincial sovereignties, it must also address the federal incursion into the self-sovereignty of the indigenous people. We have common cause; let’s recognize it and stand firmly and resolutely together to stop Trudeau’s unending attempt to accumulate power over all of us.
