Reconciliation gone mad

Vincent J. Curtis

5 Mar 2020


The Wetsuewet’en crisis is a case of reconciliation gone mad.  That First Nation has a total population of about 3,000 people, and is claiming 23.000 square kilometers of north central British Columbia as the land over which they hold title.  (Never mind the contradiction in claiming “title” when what is meant is “sovereignty.”  Title exists as a holding within a sovereignty – in this case Canada.  If you claim title, you implicitly recognize the sovereignty of Canada, since that is the sovereignty you claim title from.)

The B.C. Supreme Court rejected the extraordinarily large land claim, and upon appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada the Court declined to rule, instead offering a path to a negotiated political settlement.  Evidently, SCC wasn’t about to consent to the size of the claim either.  Since that 1997 decision, no negotiations have occurred, and some of the First Nation leadership maintain a maximalist position.  Neither side possesses the leverage to oblige compromise on the other.

The goverance of the Wetsuewet’en is complex and internally competitive.  It is capable of veto, but any positive action requires practical unanimity.  The First Nation is divided into five clans and further subdivided into thirteen houses.  There are thirteen hereditary chiefs, elected chiefs, and twenty band councils.  The bona fides of a “hereditary” chief is sketchy, and gang-leader is perhaps a more apt description of the office holder.  Physical violence seems not far below the surface.  The Office of Hereditary Chiefs is the political arm of this group, which is not recognized by either Ottawa or Victoria, and it is not clear how the group gets its funding.  There is speculation that donations from foreign sources pay to keep this group active.

The GasLink pipeline project followed the SCC recommended process to obtain permission to run the pipeline through the disputed land, and only a minority of the hereditary chiefs continue to oppose it.  These are the ones leading gang-like action blockading construction.

GasLink did its job, got the required permits, and in good faith began construction.  It is the impossibility of the Wetsuewet’en to govern themselves that is causing the problem.  The First Nation simply cannot take a decision and stick with it.  It cannot police itself.

Since the elected band councils and chiefs are prepared to do nothing to enforce their side of the bargain, there are only two options to complete the project.  The first is to outright bribe the gang-leaders sufficient for their avarice, and the other is to enforce the rule of law with strong federal police action and powerful legal consequences for the gangs.

Neither course amounts to reconciliation, but that is where this chimera has led us.
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