We don’t want the armed forces to come in. Stop them anyway you can. They have already arrived at Six Nations with their paddy wagons, ambulances and everything!
MNN. May 31 2006. The talks between Six Nations and Ontario have stalemated. So what else is new? Never mind the Supreme Court of Canada has determined that Canada has a duty to consult and accommodate Indigenous people and that differences should be resolved by negotiation. Never mind that this position is backed by international law. Never mind that Indigenous relations with the British are founded on a nation-to-nation basis. Never mind that Peterson has not consulted the Canadian people and that polls say the majority support us – this is despite massive public misinformation in the education system, disinformation campaigns conducted overtly by the Canadian government and deliberate suppression of the facts in the corporate media. Anyone with any sense can see that we have a valid claim. Peterson has decided to ignore all this. “It’s my way or the highway”, according to him. This is an emergency.
The Canadian authorities have always refused to deal with us legally, on a nation-to-nation basis, the way the British did. Canadian officials want to keep the colonization process going. That’s why land claims have always been stalled.
Simply put, they stole our land and don’t want to give it back. David Peterson suffered a lapse of honor, if he ever had any. He decided not to recognize that the Six Nations people are the rightful owners of the “Burtch Lands”. He’s even forgotten the moratorium on construction. Sucking his thumb and straightening out his beanie with the propeller on it, he cried, “Wah-wah! I want three barricades taken down instead of one”. The Six Nations people already carried out our part of the deal and opened up Argyle Street in Caledonia. So what happens now? Peterson isn’t the only one having a fit of the terrible two’s.
Nearsighted judge, Michael Marshall, who gave those illegal injunctions on March 17th, is also having a temper tantrum. This man is dangerous. He’s sitting on the side but it was his “legal” invention that sparked the powder keg and set off all the subsequent violence. He demanded at that time that ALL the barricades must come down immediately and that the Indigenous people go home [even though we are at home on our reclaimed land]. Marshall’s “off with their heads” injunction also threatened that anyone found back in the reclaimed area would be arrested, fingerprinted, released and placed on probation. If they boomeranged back, they would be arrested and receive 30 days of free room and board. He has ordered everybody to come to his June 1st “hanging” party. “Boo-hoo! Why weren’t my orders followed immediately?” he pouted and stomped his foot petulantly.
Then former OPP [Ontario Provincial Premier] Petersen stalled, coughed, hurmpht and blinked his eyes, “Well, I’ve changed my little mind and decided that a promise is not a promise when you make it to an Indian”. At the same time, if the Six Nations people don’t attend the court party, allow themselves to be arrested and remove all their barricades, they’re going to have hissy fit and escalate the violence.
Judge Marshall is hysterical because he owns land on the Haldimand Tract. At the beginning the Six Nations People had demanded that he take himself off the case because he was in a classic position of conflict of interest, sitting on a case that involves his personal economic interest. This one-horse judge and his rinky-dink kangaroo court have no jurisdiction in this issue. This is an international matter. Britain was dealing with us on a nation-to-nation basis.
General Haldimand promised to protect us on the Grand River territory forever. We never relinquished our sovereignty or our right to make the law on our own land and for our own people. Haldimand understood this deal. Some of the successors don’t. As Deskahe pointed out in the 1920’s Britain could not give Canada more than it had to give. Canada doesn’t own us or our sovereignty. Michael Marshall doesn’t have jurisdiction to dictate what happens to us on our land. Colonial courts have been covertly supporting squatters and other illegal invaders for over 200 years. They committed an illegal invasion on sovereign Six Nations territory.
They want to take a giant step backwards into the 19th century. They want to bring in the armed forces with all their guns loaded and their minds loaded with racism. Marshall’s silly injunction convicting all kinds of unnamed people for uncommitted offences had already seriously disrupted the peace in rural Caledonia. Just think what this wacko army assault may do. It could be the spark that ignites the powder keg of repressed emotions right across Canada. The Six Nations are not the only people who have suffered injustices at the hands of the colonial system.
People should stop worrying about the army coming in. Don’t let them come in. Let us see what the rest of Turtle Island is going to do. Canadian officials like Peterson and Marshall are setting up a situation that could destabilize Canada. What Canada is doing is illegal. It’s cruel. It’s dangerous. It’s corrupt.
The Canadian government has always been a greedy monster. Their citizens are onto them. We’ve been standing on our land for 92 days now. We are not leaving. We’ve come out of the shadow of colonialism and we’re never going back. What, us worried? It is the outsiders who are worried.
We never challenged Canada and Ontario to bring in their armed forces on us. We always knew that this matter must be resolved politically on a nation-to-nation basis. Why wait for an inquiry? Why wait for another death like Dudley George at Ipperwash? Why another Gustafsen Lake? Why another Oka? The colonial occupiers do not respect the law and human rights and human life. The criminals in charge are the corporate bosses of Canada. Our land and resources belong to us and we intend to stop the theft. That’s what we are saying.
If you send in your army, Canada, we will call out to all our friends and allies in Canada and the international community to come to our aid finally. Violence, illegal use of power, is how you have always conducted yourselves from the beginning. From our experience with you, we should not have expected any honor.
The courts and Parliament cannot resolve this. The people of Canada can. Your democracy is in need of an overhaul. Canada sending in the military will never make this issue go away. We have no place to go but to our home on Turtle Island. We have been threatened for 500 years to the point where merely 1% of our people survived the biggest holocaust in all humanity. These monsters continue to commit these crimes against our people. When are you going to end this?
You have to break this cycle. We ask many Canadians and Americans, “Why did you come here?” You came here to escape starvation, enslavement and death. Now you are here living on our land and you have created a system of enslavement, death and inequality. Most of you sit on the sidelines and even compromise yourselves by putting on a uniform to commit the crimes you ran away from. You’re doing it to get a paycheck?
We don’t need the rhetoric. We need people, communities and nations to start preparing yourselves to take whatever action is necessary should Canada use force against our people again. We don’t accept your rules of the game, “It’s my ball and my net and the game is over”. Peterson and Marshall, get out of the playground quick!
The people responsible are not on the frontlines. They are the ones laughing all the way to the bank. They want to put the Indians “back in the cupboard” before that big Bilderberg meeting in Ottawa takes place on June 8th. These are 128 billionaires who are running the globe converging on Ottawa! What does that tell you?
Kahentinetha Horn
MNN Mohawk Nation News
www.mohawknationnews.com
kahentinetha2@yahoo.com
We need help. We need your solidarity and support physically, through letter writing, political pressure and standing with us at Six Nations to stop the murderous designs of these corporate crazies who run the governments.
thebasketcase@on.aibn.com; jacqueline_house@hotmail.com; Thahoketoteh@mohawknationnews.com; Katenies20@yahoo.com;
