The letters are the opinion of our readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Nation and its staff.

VOLUME 13-07

Destroying to build anew

Thursday February 2, 2006, will always be a special day for me. That morning in La Tuque I bought a sledgehammer and I got to use it. I started hammering away near the doorway (corner) of the residential school on the girls’ side. Hardly anybody was around, everybody had already left, except the demolition crew. I got to see with my own eyes, the highest section (the gym) of the school fall over. Standing there with my sledgehammer, I was witnessing a historical moment in Canada. That is the history I will tell my children and grandchildren.
That special moment I hit the building with the sledgehammer, that was between me, God, and my mother watching from heaven. She cried a lot when we were all taken away to the residential schools. Like I mentioned to you before, I was happy when they closed them down and I was very happy to be there when they tore the school down. As for the bricks I brought back to Cree land, I will ask my friends to help me scatter them to the four winds, to throw them in the deepest lakes or their traplines (I asked one elder already, Mr. Rabbitskin from Mistissini, to throw one brick in the deepest part or the centre of Mistissini Lake).
Before I ever heard or knew about the demolition of the La Tuque Residential school, I had a dream. As a hunter, if you had a good dream you told nobody, you just went to search for your dream. They say, “Tell the bad dreams, so they won’t happen. The good dreams, that’s how the Creator shares the future with you.”
In my dream, somebody handed or gave me a fish, just one fish. I was very happy of the one fish I was given. The dream was so real, when I got up sweating, I looked for the fish in my hand. This was a happy dream actually, I was a little excited about it. Of course, after a dream like this in the bush or not, I am looking forward to the day or days. I ponder about the dream, thinking of the story about Jesus, who fed thousands of people with just one fish.
Between you and me (Arnold), part of that dream has come to pass already and I must journey or we must journey to find the rest.
That dream I had, I am a grandfather now, it was like the dreams our ancestors had before a search or a good hunt.
I went to search and I found the dream, it was a good hunt by all means. I know the school was buried in white snow after we left La Tuque. In our hunting society, winter with its deep snow and together with the north wind have been the most generous to our people. It was that kind of day on February 2, 2006. After each kill of any moose, we know the Creator will cover all the tracks with fresh white snow, wherever the large animals had walked before giving their lives up to the hunters.
It’s just sad, an event like that in La Tuque would bring strangers, people, closer together. I got to know about a sweet girl named Julliette Rabbit, who never made it home to Mistissini, but only to heaven. Whatever we left or brought back home from La Tuque on that cold winter day, we the survivors of these schools, who walked in the hallways of these stone-cold buildings, know that the tools used to tear down these monuments are also the same tools you need to build with.
La Tuque is a nice town, with nice people, as I found out when I stayed in one of the town’s motels for the very first time in my life. Last time I ever slept in La Tuque was at that residential or boarding school, which they were planning to demolish now and the reason I was there. However, part of this town’s history will be about the “Stolen People” who lived on the top of that hill on the north-east side of the town in the direction the sun rises from.
My reason to be in La Tuque will always remain between me and God. My father is too old to travel now, but I had his blessing to go on this trip. I had many other people’s blessings as I departed for the long trip to La Tuque. Some said to “bring back something home.” Others said “we will pray for you and light candles at the exact time the demolition will start.” Besides all this, people wanted me to call back home to Waswanipi, to go live on the local radio station, while the main event was happening in La Tuque.
This was my pleasure. I kept my promises. I am a first-time grandfather now, and besides bringing three young people to witness the event, I brought my first grandchild, Faith Chantal Joy (named by her young cousins), with me to witness this historical moment for all aboriginal people across this country. No matter where the residential school was, they had the same owners and used the same policies: “kill the Indian in them.” My wife, who is also a residential school survivor from Mistissini, was there with us (we both attended the residential school in La Tuque at different times).
For the first time, I can say I really enjoyed my stay in La Tuque. I am looking forward to another day, another town, another residential school with my sledgehammer. In my life, I was once a scared little child attending one or more of these Indian boarding schools far from home. Then one fine day comes – what do you know – you have a sledgehammer in your hand, you’re in charge, you’re just pounding away at the stone on the girl’s side (future wife’s) of the school. You have got to try this one day, yourself.
I even had the pleasure to give a souvenir away: a brick I had knocked off from a wall, to a former principal of one of these schools. I was kind enough to let him ask for it first, before giving him the brick. One of my close friends, also a residential school survivor, found out about my generosity and said to me: “if I was you, I would have gave it to him over the head, even if he doesn’t ask for the souvenir.” Lucky for the former principal, I did not bring that friend along.
As a survivor, I can only wish for and long for my childhood days with my parents, brothers, sisters and other relatives. I must face the fact that I can never recover my lost childhood, not in this lifetime or ever. Nor can our parents recover what they lost as young parents, to have all their children taken away. One way or another, we all paid with our lives, we aboriginal people across this country.
The only thing left to do is for we aboriginal people to journey together. Together with our children, grandchildren, and our elders, try to recover, struggle to win, and to heal, so we can be strong again, even if it takes a lifetime. I know it will.
As our ancestors lived: we had a dream and we went to search for it. We killed a dragon and brought it home. We shared the kill and ate it too, so we can survive another day.
Familiar story.
Yours in the Spirit World,
Paul Dixon

VOLUME 13-03

Card or not, Crees have right to health care

This is in response to Will Nicholl’s editorial in the Nation (“Deadly Bureaucracy,” October 28, 2005). It was unfortunate that you contracted acute tonsillitis and had to run around to see how you can be served as a beneficiary. I hope that you are now completely healed from your tonsillitis.

To begin, I would like to explain to you the jurisdictional responsibility of Cree Board of Health and Social Services of James Bay. I think that it is important to understand this in order to avoid certain expectations in the future.

The health care and social services system in Quebec is based on geography. There are 18 regions. The CBHSSJB is region 18. The CBHSSJB has the same role and responsibility for the health and wellbeing of all people living in region 18 (category 1 and 2 lands of Iiyiyiu Aschii). Whether an individual is a beneficiary or not does not change the services provided. Any person living or traveling on the territory will be attended to in any emergency even in the absence of a medical card.

The CBHSSJB is currently in a phase of reorganization and we are lacking an accessible client information system that would normally contain relevant patient information. If it had been in place at the time of your incident, you would have called the attendee and he or she would have recommended you to go directly to the hospital without worrying about a medical card. We hope to have this kind of information system in place in the next few years.

The Cree Patient Services in Montreal exists specifically to oversee beneficiaries with specific needs that come down from their communities to receive specialized services. They are not directly involved in the care of patients except for those who are referred by doctors from one of the Cree communities. (Some Public Health workers are still temporarily in Montreal for historical reasons and because there are not enough houses in Iiyiyiu Aschii at this time to accommodate them. They are involved in population health approaches and not in individual care provision.)

I hope this clarifies how our system currently functions and that it may help you and your readers to have a better understanding of how we try to accommodate beneficiaries to the best of our capacity.

Sincerely,

Joanne Bezzubetz,

Executive Director, CBHSSJB

VOLUME 12-26

Beyond Borders

What is it like to be a Cree woman, who lives in a Cree community outside of the “Cree” territory, and face issues of discrimination and personal rejection based on geographical factors? The most prevalent geographical factor includes the Ontario/Quebec provincial border that was created with the unequivocal purpose of division.

The theme of borders and division play into many factors in my life, more specifically with the divisions that exist because of the James Bay Northern Quebec Agreement of 1975. Since when did the Cree territory give way to the amorphous and contradictory natures of borderlines and boundaries? Apparently when the border was created in the 1800s and again when it was solidified in 1975.

I was born in Moose Factory, Ontario, three years after the JBNQA was signed on behalf of the Cree and all of the future Cree born into the agreement thereafter. The dynamics of the migration to Moose Factory for many Quebec Cree are diverse, but valid nonetheless. Families relocated because they were recruited for trapping in northern Ontario, or for employment opportunities with the railroad or at the hospital.

Perhaps the most effective example of relocation to use, and only because so many Cree have some connection to this, would be Horden Hall residential school. One can speculate that people still harbor issues from their experience and incorporate that into their policy and decision making, such as excluding Moose Factory as part of the territory.

Besides the categorization of Cree land in Quebec by the JBNQA, which gives legal verification, how is it that the city of Val D’or is more of a Cree community than Moose Factory? Where can you find a greater number of beneficiaries raising their generations in one spot outside of the territory than Moose Factory? Sadly, I thought that Cree directives would include the goal of increasing the Cree nation to include all of its members and beneficiaries, making one strong and united nation.

For a long time I did not really know what MoCreebec did or what it was accomplishing. Occasionally, I would get a MoCreebec newsletter believing that they were sent to me out of obligation because MoCreebec was receiving money for my band affiliation and beneficiary number, which I was surprised to learn, was not the case at all.

When MoCreebec and the CMHC housing program gave me the opportunity to rent an apartment in 1997, I began to notice the acts of kindness and efforts that were extended to “Quebec Indians” like me and other people who fell through the cracks of the divisions and limitation of services on Moose Factory Island.

I have decided that I will always be strongly affiliated with MoCreebec, an organization that has managed to create and accomplish so much despite the fact that they are continuously denied core funding for their programs from governments and the Cree, and who are so blatantly discriminated against by the policies their own people maintain.

Each year, I have been given ample opportunity to grow and learn while I work at MoCreebec. This article came out of the space and freedom that working with MoCreebec provides me with. My growth is equally important as the work that I contribute to the organization. My cumulative experience at MoCreebec is the motivation behind writing this long overdue article.

I sit and watch the Cree arguing with each other through the non-Aboriginal lawyers we hire to settle legislation initiated by a non-Aboriginal government in a non-Aboriginal court.

One of the most obvious failures of a legal system that claims to be fair and just is that its creation and design was specifically for people with money. The people with money and power can use the system to drain their opponents’ resources. Is this the Cree way?

I use this reality to demonstrate the fact that ingrained colonialistic policies and practices are written within the words of the JBNQA and the New Agreement, and yet the focus seems to be solely on dollar signs. I find it interesting that section 3.2.7, although approved by the Cree, was a government-initiated idea.

Is there that much lack of faith by Cree leaders in Cree people that we feel like we have to restrict their ability to exist as beneficiaries and Cree people beyond the territory? That we had to specifically design a clause in the agreement that keeps Indians on their reserves? Out of sight and out of mind is the phrase that comes to mind.

The obvious fact that the Cree are letting words on paper decide who they are is absurd. I am Cree no matter where I choose to reside or where I am domiciled.

These limitations have such a great influence on who we are as Cree people, we should be asking ourselves if we have made any steps forward with sovereignty or have we been colonized so successfully that these new agreements are not modern day treaties, but modern-day tools of colonialism and control that we are efficiently implementing amongst our own people?

I live 45 km from the province of Quebec and the Cree territory. As a Cree woman I refuse to let an invisible line declare that I am no longer Cree, define who I am or contain me to any place without the freedom of choice. This border is a representation of a physical demarcation of our people and culture, although I believe its credibility is fictitious.

We share collective memories and knowledge as Cree people. Our intellectual property is archived and inherent in all our beautiful Cree children who are born through our bloodlines. I am a Cree woman no matter where I go, and my heart and identity go well beyond borders.

Anonymous

VOLUME 12-23

History lost for video games

So the Rupert River will follow the same path as many great rivers have gone before.

Land clearings, river diversions, cooperation with tallymen, assessments, relocations of human and wildlife, and the list goes on. Surveys carried out in 2000 and 2002 could no longer be valid because of the strange environmental impacts caused by man and nature in 2005.

I was at the LG-1 reservoir the other day. At this reservoir, Hydro-Quebec showed tourists the great project of the century. Yet, on the other hand, they also showed the production of a sod dwelling that is centuries old and used by the Cree of long ago. The presence of that sod hut left a larger impact on tourists than the dam. Why? Because it is historical and can never be replaced.

Also that same day there were people from Moose Factory. The grandmother of the group told a small boy, "This is where the power comes from so you can play your games on television." The information didn't bother the boy, as does many individuals in the Cree Nation.

I blame the many Cree leaders who should know better. Those leaders who never made a move to save a river - one beautiful river. This river can never be replaced once it is diverted.

Margaret Cromarty,
a Cree author, artist, tour operator, mother and grand-mother trying to save the Rupert River.

They're out there

They seem to walk aimlessly around the village of Chisasibi every day and night. On weekends, these beings take over the village. They can barely stand, let alone walk; yet they make their way to God knows where. They usually hang out in packs. With lost balance, blurred-vision, and the reduced ability to speak clearly, they are undoubtedly looking for more booze, drugs or a party.

Their numbers are staggering, and they create fear for people who are trying to spend a well-deserved weekend after a long week's work. These people who seem to enjoy being seen in a drunken state and seem to take pleasure in scaring the elderly and young children do not seem to respect the townspeople. For instance, they find their way to the commercial centre, bother people there, vomit on the public floor, and spit on some poor soul as he or she comes in or goes out of the building. They do the same at the General Store, at the arena, but I have yet to see them at the hospital. Thank God they stay away from the hospital. In addition, they fight on the streets, pass out on them, and they even interrupt a walking-out ceremony on a quiet summer weekend morning. All of the acts mentioned above are done under the watchful eyes of young children who are simply playing outside innocently.

What do you suppose these children think when they see drunks behaving strangely around them? Do they run away screaming fearing for their safety, or are they accustomed to seeing drunks walking around town with beer cans in their hands? The answer to this question is both. Some kids get scared while others simply ignore the drunks.

This is what I want to discuss: children, as we all know, can easily be influenced. By being constantly exposed to drunks and their acts, the children begin to see these drunken behaviours as normal, as something that plays a part in their lives. The images of drunken adults and even young teenagers become imprinted in their innocent young minds. Next thing we know these children grow up and do exactly the things they saw. They end up getting alcohol and drugs, and start doing the same exact acts they witnessed as children. Why? Because they have learned that alcohol and drugs, and the behaviours that are created by these products, are valued around them. These children soon see that parties and walking around town under the influence of drugs and alcohol are simply ways of life here in Chisasibi, the normal and cool thing to do. But we know better don't we? If we do not, we should.

Children should not be exposed to sights such as these. They deserve better. They deserve to have fun and be happy, to explore and grow in an environment free from drunks who use foul language in public, who beat up each other for some unknown reason, and countless other unacceptable acts done publicly. Let us rear our children in a safe environment free from unwanted behaviours that are created by the consumption of drugs and alcohol. Wandering drunks should remain indoors, away from those people who simply want to have a nice day or weekend.

Let us think about our children. Let us protect them from unwanted stimuli, from things that can harm their future. Those of you who like to drink, please drink and remain indoors, for our children - our future leaders - are watching.

A concerned Chisasibi resident

JBNQA serves Cree interests

I wanted to comment on your editorial, "Elections are opportunity for nation building," to provide a different understanding of what the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA) represents to the Crees. My father, Joseph Petagumskum, who passed away this spring, was the Chief of Whapmagoostui when that legal instrument was negotiated. Eventually, he signed that important accord on behalf of our community.

My father, in his own way, let me know that the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement was a legal instrument the Crees are using to develop a relationship with the governments of Canada and Quebec. This relationship has been in place for over 30 years now, and over that time the Crees have used the JBNQA as a means of ongoing nation building. My father also explained to me that the JBNQA helped our people reverse the historical neglect of the Crees' needs by the Canadian and Quebec governments. Cree control of education, health, human resources, and other areas of importance are directly tied to the JBNQA.

The JBNQA is not "one of the biggest sellouts," as you put it. [Ed. note: the editorial actually argues against this point of view. The Nation has never taken this position.] It is not a road map leading to the alienation of Cree land and rights, as some would have us believe. The JBNQA has become the shield with which the Crees have successfully protected the Cree culture and various types of Cree rights from external governments and big business. The JBNQA has also helped promote and protect the general welfare of the Crees. Before the JBNQA the Crees had nothing to use legally to promote and protect their traditional way of life. To this day, even though Aboriginal rights are protected under Section 35 of the Constitution of Canada, many First Nations remain defenseless without a legal instrument to use to advance their rights and interests.

Over the last 30 years the Cree Nation leadership has been taking practical, incremental measures to ensure its realization. The strange thing is that many Crees do even see that this has been taking place all along and within the context of the JBNQA.

It is well-advised political campaigns and strategies, combative negotiations, and carefully planned court battles, using legal instruments such as the JBNQA, which have earned the Cree Nation respect nationally and internationally. Ill-advised agendas can only serve to undermine the hard-earned credibility and respect that is collectively enjoyed by the Cree Nation.

Can we realistically expect any worthwhile agreements to be acquired when some advise us to "take a minimum of one year to consider any agreement affecting the Crees in the long term"? It is a no-brainer that there are civil servants in the governments of Canada and Quebec who feel that it is their job to protect the public purse and prevent such agreements with First Nations from being concluded.

Our national leadership has done very well in supporting the whole nation. I trust my father's advice still today and I resent those who have yet to prove themselves denigrating his judgment.

Weemish Petagumskum

Whapmagoostui

::EMAIL FEEDBACK::

from the Nation website

Poison kudos and pens

This is a response to your article titled "Poison...HISTORY" concerning the Ouje-Bougoumou contamination. In the story it begins that it started five years ago when people asked game wardens if there was anything wrong with the fish, and were told nothing. Luckily to say, someone listened.

However, some people may ask how the American geologist, Christopher Covel, first arrived in Ouje-Bougoumou and who was that person who asked him if the mines could kill the fish. Well, I'm confident and delighted to say that person was Mr. David Bosum Sr. of Ouje-Bougoumou; he was the first to finally take the stand.

David has a business called Nuuhchimi Wiinuu Cree Cultural Tours. It invites tourists all around the world to have a taste of the Cree Culture in the northern atmosphere. However, an American geologist named Christopher Covel and a couple of other Americans contacted David to book for one week. When they arrived they were taken out in the bush to experience the Cree way of Life. It was at the end of their tour when they were taken to a campground near Chibougamau Lake. It was then David asked Chris if the mining could make the fish sick. And so, the story begins...

I believe a lot of thank-yous are owed to Mr. David Bosum Sr. from the people of Ouje-Bougoumou for his bravery.

Naomi Bosum

I first want to thank the Nation to be interested and to continue to publish articles on environmental issues and, in particular, on the problem of contamination in Ouje area.

Yet, I want to mention an error in the article. Dr. Eric Dewailly is working for the Institut national de santé publique (INSPQ) and Université Laval (Québec) and not at all for the Quebec Environment Ministry.

Bonnier Viger

Ed. note: You're right, we slipped. The Nation regrets the error.

The information you obtained for your article was available last year. The impression in the story is that you had to dig it up because somebody was hiding it.

The timing and use of this dated information was to shock the community of OJ and influence their vote.

Will, your standards are getting a bit low.

Bill Namagoose

Executive Director, Grand Council of the Cree

Ed. Note: The Grand Council of the Cree may have been aware for a year that the waters around Ouje-Bougoumou have been poisoned. But that doesn't explain why the GCC didn't denounce the situation or discuss it with the people of OJ (much less the Nation), nor why the Quebec government wouldn't do the same. The Nation will always publish information of public interest, dated or not.

Father-son reunion a tearjerker

I think it would make people cry if they saw it on APTN about Daniel and Cory meeting together after 29 long years. I felt my tears when I heard their story. Daniel told the story to my dad and my dad told me. I can't wait to meet my uncle too, I play hockey also and most of his cousins and nephews plays.

Byron Sam

The first time I heard that he had finally met his dad I was crying because I didn't realize he would accept his dad. I'm happy for both of them that they finally met after 29 years. We can't wait to meet him.  

Greta

More legends, please

I want to read more of the past or the legends of the Cree people. Our Elders are getting old and some have passed on already. We should take this chance to still hear the stories from our elders while we still can. They are the key to the way it used to be.

John

Hydro-Quebec doesn't get it

So what else is new? Hydro-Quebec never has understood, and as long as they keep trying to write the Cree up as some kind of sociological exercise they never will. Maybe if they put some of the same passion they put into their fight against the loss of French language and culture they might. They should stop focusing on our differences and enjoy all the wonderful things that we all share as human beings.

Mark Eitzen

I read your commentary on the EIA with great interest. As a fellow academic I agree very much with Harvey Feit's assessment and was pleased to see your coverage in the Nation. But there is one key issue that is not highlighted in Feit's assessment that I think is of great importance - and I have raised this issue with CEAA and HQ as well as the GCC. Currently, there is no adequate gender impact assessment in the EIA, except in terms of health. This is a grievous oversight and I think Cree women and girls need to have an economic and cultural assessment in addition to simply a review of potential health impacts.

I am an expert on social impact assessments and spent 18 months in James Bay on my doctoral thesis in the mid-1990s. I hope you can also highlight the need for a gender impact assessment in a future issue of the Nation. In other parts of the world, indigenous women are demanding this (e.g., Voisey Bay) and I think Cree women and girls deserve equal consideration.

Dr Gail Whiteman
Assistant Professor, Department of Business-Society Management, Erasmus University, The Netherlands

Send Christmas dinner, please

I came to Montreal two years ago to live here. I have a question that needs to be answered.

I think all the native people that live here should have funding from our bands to have a feast at least for Christmas holidays.

Not only for these people, but for the natives who come from the north to have some resources from our leaders.

The Makivik Corporation gives some traditional food that is flown from the north for the Inuit in Montreal.

I am Cree, and if I don't eat traditional food for some time I crave it. We people should not be forgotten, because we don't live on our reserves.

We're still native people, but prefer to live somewhere we want to.

So tell our leaders there are some of us who still exist.

Annie Sheshamush

AUGUST, 2005
RE: Thank God for Cree Board
It was very refreshing to read the writer's attitude on being thankful for getting a Cree-funded education. My only option after graduating from high school in Noranda, Quebec was to work in the mine, since my parents had no university funds for me. No regrets though.
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CSB
I want to thank the CSB for everything they've done for me. Every time I asked for sponsorship they always came through for me.

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Hydro
So what else is new! Hydro Quebec has never understood.

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JULY, 2005
Grateful, or too grateful
As a past student and beneficiary of the Cree School Board, I found that the amounts of funds that were given were very pleasing. I completed 4 years and received my degree. I was very pleased for the amounts that I was receiving, until my third year when I discovered that I did not receive enough for my cost of living.
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Thank God for Cree School Board
I read the article about about the woman that complains about the CSB funding. I am a single person living in a city and studying and I am just grateful for what i get from CSB.

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MAY, 2005
One More River:
A fair reminder!
One should acknowledge Grand Chief Dr. Ted Moses, O.Q., for his tenacity and determination for standing by an agreement he promoted, signed, sealed and delivered.
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A Cry for One More River
I would like to say Meegwetch to all the people who worked on the documentary One More River.

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Ten reasons a Cree School Board student should be grateful

1. No student loans to pay off after graduation

According to CBC News Online, the average debt on student loans is $25,000, which usually takes 10 years to pay. As CSB students, we graduate debt-free.

APRIL, 2005
Re: “School board may increase student support,” vol. 12, no. 10, April 1, 2005
First I would like to introduce myself. I am an Aboriginal Law and Advocacy student who is sponsored with CSB as well. I am finishing off my last year in my program at Negahneewin/ Confedera-tion College in Thunder Bay, Ontario. I have four children with me and yes, it is hard to live on a fixed income, but I still manage to survive to an extent.
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Still in Search of a Kidney Donor
Dear Nation Readers,

Hello, my name is Yvonne Bosum and I am from the Ouje-Bougoumou Cree Nation. I am 36 years old, and have a wonderful son who is 9 years old. At the moment I live in Fort-St-James, British Columbia. I know I am miles away from my family, and it is not easy for me at the moment. Five years ago I was diagnosed with kidney failure; both of my kidneys failed on me and now only 20 per cent of each kidney works. I used to be on the peritoneal home

Freedom
Life in the Cree world these days is different. Those who came before us led a life dictated largely by the need to survive. Everyone knew their role and had no choice but to accept the weight of their decisions. Today, largely as a result of the agreements we have signed, life is becoming more comfortable, and the struggle to survive is replaced, for many of us, by a life of comforts and freedoms.
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Open Letter to the Waswanipi Survivors of the Mohawk Residential School (Brantford, Ontario)

I have attended meetings both in London and conducted meetings in the community to relate information and to gain instructions from the survivors to convey to the lawyers working on the lawsuit. I am a member of the Steering Committee for the advancement of the lawsuit, which meets in London to give instructions to the law team and to receive information on the progress of the team’s efforts.

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Rallye International du Chibougamou

As a supporter of the Rallye International du Chibougamou and as a parent of one of the participants in this past weekend’s events, I must, after much reflection and deliberation, express to you my most profound disappointment...

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Nemaskau Eenouch So Much for a New Relationship:
Hydro-Quebec and James Bay Municipality sign $310 Million Agreement

Premier Jean Charest, Mr. Thierry Vandal, President of Hydro-Quebec Production and Mr. Sam Hamad, Minister of Natural Resource along with certain “dignitaries” of the Municipalité de la Baie-James, made a surprise but very subtle visit to the Eastmain-1 Camp site at the end of January 2005, which for those who knew thought was just a visit to the Eastmain-1 work camp and the construction site.

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FEBRUARY, 2005
Open Letter
This letter is in response to questions which have been raised recently regarding the eligibility of Mr. Gaston Cooper to have been elected, and to continue to serve, as Councillor in Ouje-Bougoumou.
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Applause for Hughboy

I think it’s high time somebody spoke out about what’s happening in our communities.

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Ouje-Bougoumou, politically challenged

I think that Tony Hughboy should be given a chance to run. He always makes good remarks. Sometimes it’s good to have an outside person come in and make a difference. He did make a point about the expenses by the council members. Bringing their spouses all expenses paid.

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January, 2005
Dear Daddy,
It has been 2 months and 5 days since the last time I saw you. I remember the last time you said that you “will be back soon.”
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My dearest true Love Andrew,
I love you so much and I really miss you a lot. Oh Andrew what can I say! I just don’t have the words to tell you how I feel; I just don’t know what to say. I just don’t know where you are. I don’t know anymore. I’m scared baby I am. What can I do to ease this pain that I carry everyday? How can this happen to me, the girls?
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I Remember, Part 1:
October of 1998
My name is Louis Neacappo. My official papers say my name is Louis J.G. Neacappo. As a coach, I’m known as the Basketball Emperor. But before I was in a wheelchair, back in the days when I was terrorizing the gymnasiums of other communities, they called me Big Bird!
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NOVEMBER, 2004
How many more years?
It has been over a year now for many things. It has been over a year since Joseph Shecapio-Blacksmith died, and over a year that they have not released his cause of death as he requested be done.
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Alcohol still hurts – 2
Alcohol still hurts me also and I’ve been sober now for over five years. Day in and day out, we see the effects that alcohol and other substances has on our people. This hurts me dearly.
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Alcohol still hurts – 1
Although I've been sober for over eleven years, alcohol still hurts me. For I've lost a loved one in an alcohol related accident over eleven years ago. Seeing people both young and old under the influence still brings back sad memories of the tragic day we lost our beloved son. I know this also happens to others who've lost loved ones because of alcohol related accidents.
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October, 2004
Cree trappers paying the cost
In the article in a recent Nation, “Members say Forestry board off to good start,” I wish I can say that about our traplines where the forestry companies are taking advantage of them, even more so after the A.I.P (Peace of the Brave), was signed.
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Follow-up letter to ‘Simon’s Story’
First of all, I never imagined the kind of attention Simon’s Story would generate (Nation, August 22). I have been overcome with support from the community, and I have heard of people even being brought to tears from reading his story. I never thought that my little boy’s story would bring out the best in people...
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