Saarland, April 24, 2009
Affirmation of the existence of Métis Abitibi
The Thursday, April 23, 2009, the Métis leader Marcel Paul and the Board of Directors of the Community-Wikan Mamiwinik , Abitibi-West, filed in the office of the Federal Interlocutor for Métis, the Honourable Chuck Strahl, a summary of the ethnogenesis of the Métis in Abitibi. He also requested financial support to complete their story and identify them reliably. Finally, he asked a direct access to the office contact person to inform of their cultural, economic, political and social.
The official meeting as a first for the Métis of Abitibi follows a petition from members of the contemporary Métis community made to the Canadian government began the Bloc Marc Lemay, manager of Aboriginal affairs Bloc Quebecois.
addition to members of the Board of Directors of the Community and the member Lemay, Chief Paul was accompanied by the anthropologist Sylvain Beaupre, the ethnologist Elyse Bégin and Aboriginal lawyer Pierre Montour.
Mr. Beaupre said: "Ask any historian aware of the history of Abitibi, he will tell you that there are Métis.
Mr. Montour said: "Their ethnogenesis began around 1670 when France has stepped up trading posts in Abitibi-Témiscamingue in response to the arrival of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) in James Bay."
native of Sorel, the Hus said Paul were very likely to engage in the fur trade in the 17th century. There are indeed more than a hundred contracts notarized commitment of Paul to the Great Savagery. Marcel Paul account alone four ancestors pikeminnow and Métis guide the HBC in his family tree. His mother, Anette Dicaire, it descends in a straight line Métis Dicaire Lac des Deux Montagnes (Oka).
Rendering recently in western Canada, the ruling Goodon acknowledged that it is the trappers and travelers from Quebec who gave birth to western Métis.
Armed with this vital information, the Assistant Deputy Minister Fred Caron, Senior Policy Advisor Andre Guertin and the Deputy Chief of Staff Norm Vocino promised to review the case was handed to them before responding to requests.
Mr. Caron said that Canada had no official political recognition of Métis communities across Canada. For cons, gives it exclusive access to various government programs specific to "Aboriginal off-reserve" a national organization representing non-status Indians and Metis across Canada, the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples (CAP).
Mr. Montour said that the Métis of the West, however, are represented by a Metis, the Metis National Council (MNC), but the latter denies the existence of Métis in Quebec, so that it WTP that represents, which is nonsense. Mr. Caron was then agreed that the Métis of Quebec were to be represented by a Métis organization.
contemporary Métis community-Mamiwinik Wikan, whose headquarters is located in the Abitibi-West, is a nonprofit corporation, with 400 members who identify Métis within the meaning of Article 35 of the Constitution Act 1982.
At the meeting, Marcel Paul also informed the Government that its members have agreed to exercise Métis aboriginal rights, that is to say their hunting, fishing and gathering for the year for food purposes, cultural and spiritual, and this, whatever happens.
A second meeting between the parties is expected within a month.
At the 2001 census, 3,810 people said they were Indians or Indian, Abitibi-Temiscaming, 1125 Métis or Inuit Métis and 20.
Article 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982 recognizes and affirms existing aboriginal rights of indigenous peoples, which include their Indians, Metis and Inuit.
Source: Luc Tremblay
dir. Community-Wikan Mamiwinnik
819-333-5232
buckenrut@hotmail.com
