First Nations question pipeline
Gateway proposal creates dilemmas for Alberta aboriginals
At a west Edmonton hotel last week, Cree elders, chiefs and young people invited Enbridge lawyers and members of the governmentappointed panel weighing the pros and cons of the controversial Northern Gateway pipeline proposal to join them in prayer.
The morning smudge ceremony left scented smoke wafting in the room Thursday as members of the Alexander and Swan River First Nations spoke to the joint National Energy Board-canadian Environmental Assessment Agency review panel. Like drum circles outside the building or testimony given entirely in Cree, such ceremony often anchored the public sessions, reminding participants the pipeline — if approved — will cross land indigenous people have called home for millennia.
For the first time since the hearings began at the start of January, Alberta aboriginals last week shared their warnings, expectations and concerns about the pipeline proposed to carry bitumen from Strathcona County to the west coast.
But if B.C. First Nations have championed a wall of opposition stretching beyond the pipeline corridor, the groups who presented in Edmonton instead offered questions.
“What exactly is the environmental impact? What is the remedy for everything that is taken out?” asked Lorna Morin, a member of the Enoch Cree west of Edmonton. “How will it benefit us, the pipeline itself? I believe that it’s probably needed, but what is the whole impact?”
The presenters arrived from all corners of the province, from the Alexander Nation with its two reserves on the proposed route, to the Samson Nation south of Wetaskiwin, to the Fort Chipewyan Nation north of Fort Mcmurray.
They came arguing traditional lands and wildlife must be protected, while lobbying for future employment opportunities and sometimes offering history lessons on treaty negotiations and government promises made more than a century ago. Some had clear stakes in the Gateway project — a map of the project shows the Alexander and Enoch reserves lie along the proposed corridor.
Others tried to draw attention to land claims. In Alberta, the pipeline runs primarily through Treaty 8 land. That means as many as 23 Alberta First Nations groups whose ancestors signed the 1899 treaty could count territory crossed by the pipeline as part of their traditional ceremonial, hunting, gathering, fishing or trapping grounds.
To the north, for example, the Swan River First Nation’s primary reserve lays on the south shore of Lesser Slave Lake, but members say they travel far enough south that the pipeline will impact their hunting and other traditional food-gathering.
“A lot of our treaties were oral promises,” Chief Leon Chalifoux told the panel last Thursday. “One of our fundamental promises (was) that we would continue to hunt, trap as long as the sun shines and the rivers flow.”
But, he said, “There’s been so much (industrialization) that we’re forced to travel farther and farther and farther away.”
Chalifoux said his band fears pipeline spills and ecological threats could reach beyond the pipeline corridor. “You cannot look at this pipeline in isolation of any other existing development out there.”
Enbridge considers only 43 aboriginal groups in B.C. and Alberta to be within 80 kilometres of the proposed pipeline and eligible to take a 10-per-cent equity in the project. That benefit package, if accepted, gives aboriginal groups a share of an estimated $280 million in revenue over the first 30 years of the project. Enbridge also expects employment, contract and other construction opportunities to yield $400 million for aboriginal groups during construction, and the company plans to commit money to a community trust program.
Enbridge has said as many as 40 per cent of aboriginal groups along the line have already signed on for the package, but company leadership does not identify them publicly.
On Friday, Edmonton Métis leader Melanie Omeniho said her people — numbering 18,000 along the proposed pipeline route — turned down an equity offer. They continue to seek as much of a role in the consultation process as First Nations groups have.
Early last week, Samson and Enoch Cree First Nations told the panel they want assurance their people will benefit from preferential hiring and other economic opportunities.
Pursuing economic benefits is pragmatic, NDP aboriginal affairs critic Linda Duncan said. The Edmonton Strathcona MP said it also puts First Nations leaders in the unenviable position of balancing environmental and health concerns against new jobs.
“Everybody knows in Alberta what the game is, and the First Nations know this after long experience: if they intervene, they’re going to have to cut a deal with industry” eventually, Duncan said. “That is the unfortunate double-edged sword or line that First Nations leaders dealing with resource extraction have to deal with all the time in Alberta.”
The Edmonton hearings are expected to finish Tuesday. The panel will hear from B.C. communities in February.