A growing number of First Nations leaders are voicing their concerns over calls for Alberta to separate from Canada — calls that have grown louder following the recent federal election.
On Friday, following on the heels of several other First Nations who have expressed opposition to the idea, the Chiefs of four Calgary-area First Nations also issued a statement saying that “any efforts to separate will be met with our full opposition.”
While the Chiefs express some sympathy with the “deep frustration echoing across Alberta and much of the Prairies,” saying as leaders “we too often feel unheard,” they also insist that “First Nations will not separate.”
The Chiefs said that large swaths of Alberta are governed by “sacred treaties” between First Nations and the “Imperial Crown,” including treaties 6, 7 and 8, and those areas “are held in trust by the Crown for the benefit of the Treaty First Nations, not as property of the provincial government.”
The statement adds that those treaties also predate Alberta’s entry into Confederation in 1905.
The statement is endorsed by Chief Roy Whitney of the Tsuut’ina Nation, Chief Darcy Dixon of the Bearspaw Nation, Chief Aaron Young of the Chiniki Nation and Chief Clifford Poucette of the Goodstoney Nation.
First Nations’ Chiefs say that treaties that cover a large swath of Alberta pre-date the province’s entry into Confederation and they are vowing that any efforts at Alberta separation “will be met with their full opposition.”
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Late Thursday, the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations, which represents 74 First Nations in Saskatchewan, also issued a statement expressing its “serious concern over Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s recent actions to facilitate a potential referendum on Alberta’s future in Canada.”
“We are the first peoples of these lands and waters,” said FSIN Chief Bobby Cameron. “Those that want to leave are free to do so but all the lands, waters, and resources are First Nations.”
“Any process of separation that fails to honour the true spirit and intent of our treaties would violate both constitutional and international law,” added Chief Cameron.
Following Monday’s federal election, Smith’s United Conservative Party government proposed legislation that would make it easier for citizens of Alberta to call for a vote to secede from Canada.
Smith responded to claims she is stoking the fires of separation by saying she supports a sovereign Alberta within a united Canada.
— with files from The Canadian Press
