Mass evictions won't happen, Navajos
told

By Jerry Kammer
The Arizona Republic
Jan. 6, 2000

Navajo and Hopi leaders joined federal officials Wednesday in an
attempt to ease tensions growing from rumors that there will be
mass evictions of Navajos on Feb. 1 from land the government has
awarded the Hopis.

In a joint announcement, the tribal leaders, U.S. Attorney's
Office in
Phoenix and a federal relocation officer called for calm. They
pledged to work for peaceful resolution of a stalemate concerning
Navajos who have vowed to remain on Hopi Partitioned Land.

The announcement was made by Navajo President Kelsey Begaye,
Hopi Chairman Wayne Taylor Jr., U.S. Attorney for Arizona Jose
de Jesus Rivera, and Christopher Bavasi of the Office of Navajo
and Hopi Indian Relocation.

The first of February is the legal eviction date for an estimated
two
dozen Navajo families who have refused to sign an
"accommodation agreement" that would have allowed them to lease
lands from the Hopis.

The deadline is the culmination of a land dispute that has
simmered
for more than a century between the two tribes, both of which
consider the land to be sacred.

"We will continue to work cooperatively to peacefully resolve the
issue of the few Navajos who might remain on the HPL,"
Wednesday's announcement said.

Tribal leaders and federal officials said they issued it in
response to
a flood of rumors and misinformation about the emotional land
dispute.

"There has been a lot of misinformation that people are going to
be
physically evicted on February 1," Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph
Lodge said.

"That is not going to happen, and we wanted to set the record
straight."

Lodge said that although the Hopis could evict the Navajos as of
Feb. 1, they've pledged to allow his office to pursue the process
in
federal court. That could take six to 24 months, Lodge said. It
could lead to a court order for federal marshals to evict the
Navajos.

More than 10,000 Navajos have already accepted federal
relocation benefits. Some have moved to the Navajo Reservation,
others have moved to border towns, the Valley or 34 states outside
Arizona. Several dozen Hopis have also relocated, most to the
partitioned land.

But a few Navajos remain, claiming they are bound to the land by
custom and Navajo religion. They've refused to sign the
accommodation agreement because they distrust the Hopis and
because they insist the land is theirs.

The specter of evictions has drawn international attention,
especially
as most remaining Navajos are elderly people in isolated areas,
among the last traditional Indians in the United States.

The center of Navajo resistance is Big Mountain, an area with no
paved roads, electricity or running water. The Navajos there have
won the support of dozens of groups across the United States and
in several foreign countries, who call forced relocation a
violation of
human rights.

The groups are calling on members to rally around the Navajos on
Feb. 1.

"The resisters at Big Mountain have been given the final date of
February 1st, 2000, to leave or be forcibly evicted from their
ancestral lands,"a Minnesota support group claimed in an Internet
message in late December. The group is organizing a caravan of
"human rights observers."

One of the most active opponents of relocation is Marsha
Monestersky, a native of New York who has worked with Navajo
resisters for several years.

"We're not expecting any problems on February 1," Monestersky
said Wednesday. "What we're planning is a symbolic presence on
the land (to protest relocation)."

Former Hopi Chairman Ferrell Secakuku said there's a need to
defuse rumors of impending violence on the disputed lands.

"Some people are saying that Hopi rangers are being trained in
SWAT team tactics so that when the time comes, they will be able
to go out there and clear out the Navajos," Secakuku
said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------