Robin Tress: Clearwater Lobster is fishing on unceded, unsurrendered, stolen lands and waters of the Mi’kmaq Nation. Over the last forty years, governments have favoured corporate fishing operations like Clearwater over small scale owner-operators and Mi’kmaq fishers.
Raina Young: The violence and harassment against Mi’kmaq fishers is despicable, racist behaviour. Even more concerning is the failure of the police to stop it, revealing deeper systemic racism. Imagine if it were the other way around, and Mi’kmaq fishermen were harassing white people. Such behaviour would never be tolerated. The RCMP would step in immediately. The hypocrisy and double standards show a clear racist bias.
Close to 1000 people came together this Sunday afternoon at the Grand Parade in downtown Halifax in support of the beleaguered Mi’kmaq fishers along Nova Scotia’s French Shore.
Please join us on Sunday October 18th from 2-4 pm for an action in solidarity with Mi’kmaq Fisher folks. We are all Treaty people and it is our duty to uphold Mi’kmaq treaty rights.
“I am so excited to see you all here to experience the very first Mi’kmaw self-regulated treaty sale in Nova Scotia,” Dr. Cheryl Maloney of Sipekne’katik told Haligonians looking to pick up some treaty lobster. We did a brief write-up and took some photos at the historic event.
Media release: ON FRIDAY, OCTOBER 16 AT 12:00 PM, lawfully caught Mi’kmaw livelihood lobster will be sold to Nova Scotians, as fellow treaty beneficiaries, in front of Province House during Mi’kmaq History Month.
Important open letter by Eastern Door, a group of L’nu and Indigenous lawyers in Nova Scotia & Atlantic Canada, on who gets to regulate the Moderate Livelihood fishery. “Exercising self-government in accordance with Netukulimk – allowing L’nuk fishers to work legally and rightfully – is all the Sipekne’katik First Nation has done,” they write.
Things are getting really bad in Digby County. Last night a Mi’kmaq lobster boat was torched and completely destroyed in Comeauville, Digby County, just a hop and a skip away from the Saulnierville wharf.
“The enemy of a healthy fishery is not the Mi’kmaq, but corporate profiteers like Mayer-Murphy and Risley who are bent on depleting this resource and resisting Mi’kmaq treaty rights. The Mi’kmaq fishery deserves our full support, while the corporate fishery should be shut down,” writes Chris Frazer.
This weekend we present All eyes on Mi’kma’ki, an excellent documentary short on Sipekne’katik fishers’ struggle to assert their treaty rights and establish a moderate livelihood fishery to support the community.