herald.ns.ca
Monday, April 6, 1998
The Halifax Herald Limited
Mi'kmaq loggers cutting on barren
By TERA CAMUS and JOCEYLN BETHUNE / Cape Breton Bureau
Waycobah - Mi'kmaq loggers in Nova Scotia are succeeding where Regal Goldfields failed - to
make money exploiting a designated protected area.
Two Mi'kmaq loggers have felled about a half-hectare of old-growth forest on the Bornish Hills
on River Denys Mountain in Inverness County, the Department of Natural Resources says.
The Bornish Hills are on the province's list of 31 protected areas, but a New Brunswick court
recently ruled a 1763 treaty gives natives first access to resources on Crown land.
"It's happening in Bornish and it's happening on other Crown lands in the province. ... We have
natives coming forward exercising what they call their native treaty rights," said Blaise Landry,
area supervisor for Natural Resources in Baddeck.
"We'll continue to monitor until we're given direction from government."
That direction presumably will come from Natural Resources Minister Ken MacAskill.
But for now, he's biding his time.
"We want to make very sure that we have a case before we would move to charge, if in fact we
would ever," the Victoria MLA said late last week.
"We are in constant touch with the Department of Justice and we are just going to wait and see
what action we will take, if any."
The Jim Campbells Barren, another protected site on the Cape Breton Highlands, had been
removed from the protected list by the provincial government.
But its status was restored under pressure from environmentalists angered by Regal Goldfields'
plan to mine a portion of the barren.
Mr. MacAskill says the N.B. court decision has him approaching the matter cautiously.
"It's the same as hunting. The same laws don't apply to white people as they do to natives and
harvesting wood might be the same," he said.
Joe B. Marshall of the Union of Nova Scotia Indians said the Mi'kmaq have the right to cut on the
land.
"Our position is that we have aboriginal title to all the land," he said.
The treaty guarantees Mi'kmaq rights to public land and even private land ownership could be in
question, he said.
But he said there may be room for change if government negotiates an agreement, similar to the
hunting guidelines set in 1986, for natives to stay clear of ecological reserves.
An environmentalist says the old-growth forest, one of the few remaining in the province, is in
jeopardy.
"Why does it have our strongest legislation and it's not protected?" asked Colin Stewart of the
World Wildlife Fund.
But Waycobah Band Chief Morley Googoo said residents Chuck and Junior Bernard are simply
exercising their rights.
"They're out there trying to make a living and I'm certainly not going to interfere until such time that
I need to get involved," he said.
Neither of the loggers was available for comment.
"They can do whatever they want within law and reason," Chief Googoo said, adding he doesn't
want a confrontation to ensue between natives and government on this issue.
"Only then will I get involved. ... Other than that, all the power to them."
The Confederacy of Mainland Indians would not comment on the issue of cutting on ecological
reserves. |
