Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

INUVIK (Jul 27/98) - Most Northerners give little thought to the Senate. What they do think is often less than charitable.

But many longtime Western Arctic residents think much of former government leader Nellie Cournoyea.

"Everything she's touched so far she's done a good job at," said Inuvik Mayor George Roach this week. "She certainly works more hours than the guy who spends his time in Mexico," he added, referring the case of Andrew Thompson, the former senator who rarely showed up in Ottawa.

And Cournoyea, a founder of the Committee for Aboriginal Peoples Entitlement (which led to the Inuvialuit land claim), and a former NWT government, does not think of the Senate as a retirement home.

"We have to be very, very proactive in promoting the western territory," she said. "We have to do that because all our efforts in the last while have been trying to make sure Nunavut has been up and running."

The energetic 58-year-old responds to the rumors she may be named the Western NWT senator next spring -- the creation of Nunavut will leave the West without a voice in the Senate --- by saying she wants to make sure there is a member here in the Western Arctic.

"Because of population we've always had a difficulty trying to justify that we should have a representative position. We certainly worked hard to make sure that the position existed," she said.

And she would not shun the Senate despite her post as chair of the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation.

"I'd sure seriously consider it," she said of an offer from Prime Minister Jean Chretien.

"There's been a lot of attention paid to Nunavut and as a result we're very far behind in our political profiling of the new western territory."

Cournoyea called the Senate another vehicle to further the aims of the western Arctic.

"Right now we have an MP and there's one person at the federal level trying to do their best for the territory."

Still, she echoed Chretien's victory speech when he took over as Liberal leader from John Turner and stressed how in many areas, Canadians have "work to do."

"Because of the lesser profile that we received in the creation of Nunavut, we've got a lot of work to do," Cournoyea said.