Tired of harassment by Department of Fisheries (FDO) officers and tired of both the federal and provincial governments refusal to recognize treaty rights and court decisions, some 50 Mi’kmaw fishers and their allies rallied at the entrance to the DFO offices in Dartmouth.
Much like last year, Mi’kmaw fishers exercising their treaty rights are once again the victims of vigilante acts by white settlers and harassment by RCMP and DFO officers.
Michael William McDonald: Despite what we were told, Mi’kmaw people lived in permanent village settlements.
Michael William McDonald looks into the domesticated use of the groundnut (Sipekne’) by Mi’kmaq people. “Elders in Sipekne’katik were still making bread using grounded Sipekne’ roots right up till the 1980’s. In 1984 Rebecca “Noel” Pictou stated that her Grandmother would save the largest rhizome bulbs she found and then replant them closer to their dwellings along the Shubenacadie River where they would allow them to grow and flower.”
Michael William McDonald’s extensive research into the Clans in the District of Sipekne’katik in the early 1700’s reveals the deep connection between the Mi’kmaq people and the landscape of Mi’kma’ki, the place the Mi’kmaq never ceded and have called home since time began.
Angela Bowden: “Hearing happy associated with somebody’s perpetrator of their genocide and trauma does not go well together. And, at this stage in the game, with racial tensions and hate crimes at an escalating high in Canada and indeed the world, hearing happy Canada Day can be significantly triggering for those being abused by Canada and all of its systems!”
Paul Wartman speaks with Chris GooGoo and Dawn Matheson about an initiative to improve the quality and accessibility of healthy, locally grown foods in Mi’kmaq communities. “We’ve always had agriculture. The public education system and history hasn’t told us that. We’ve always been told that we’ve been under the Indian Act, we’ve been given government handouts throughout history. We know that hasn’t always been the case–we’ve invented agriculture in many ways.”
June 4th marks the one year anniversary of the death of Chantel Moore, who was killed at the hands of an Edmundston, NB police officer. Elizabeth Goodridge reflects on Chantel’s death and what it tells us about the world we live in.
Ken Summers looks into Mi’kmaq involvement in the Goldboro LNG man camp. Sipekne’katik Chief Mike Sack tells him Mi’kmaq involvement has ended, Pieridae says that’s not the case.
On Oct. 13 last year RCMP officers stood by as 200 people interfered with Mi’kmaw fisherfolk. That mob was 200 individuals that did not appear out of thin fog. They ate their supper, put on their coats and boots and no one stopped them at the door. Fathers didn’t stop their foolish sons. Mothers turned the other way and sisters nodded to get approval. Church leaders knew. Teachers knew. Neighbors turned on neighbors whose histories are still as tangled as the fishing twine of the sinking lobster traps.