Jorge Barrera
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Apr 01/02) - A federal court judge has been asked to review the awarding of logging permits on land near Pine Point.

The Akaitcho Territory First Nation launched the court action against the minister of Indian and Northern affairs for breaching an agreement between the Nation and the federal government.

In a notice of application filed March 1 with the Federal Court's trial division in Saskatoon, Sask, the Akaitcho ask the court to overturn the approval of two logging permits given a Hay River company by Robert Nault.

Nault and Patterson Sawmill are named in the application.

The document alleges that Nault breached a land claim agreement between Canada and the Akaitcho by accepting a recommendation from an environmental regulatory body to give Patterson two permits to cut 5,000 cubic metres of timber.

Fort Resolution Chief Robert Sayine said the proposed logging area will seriously damage trapping areas used by local trappers to live.

"When the logging takes place it will destroy trapping," said Sayine.

The contentious piece of land near the abandoned Pine Point mine reflects the changing dynamics in the territory.

On the one hand there is the Akaitcho Treaty 8 Nation in the midst of treaty entitlement negotiations with the federal government.

Members of the First Nation claim they never ceded their rights to the land, and after years being left out of decision-making processes, they are reasserting their rights.

Family business at risk

On the other is the Patterson Sawmill, 40 years in the North and run by 81-year-old Eugene Patterson. The company is caught in the crossfire of a battle much bigger than the two pieces of property it needs to secure to survive.

"It's obvious that someone wants to extinguish the family business and they are going to succeed," said Patterson about the newest development.

Patterson said he didn't know why he was named in the court action.

He said he followed proper steps to obtain permission to log.

Last March, Patterson's business teetered on the brink of closure after the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board issued a stop-work pending completion of an environmental study.

The same board would have issued the company the two permits based on a recommendation from the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board that Nault adopted on Jan. 31, triggering the Akaitcho court challenge.

The Akaitcho suit states that by approving the impact board's recommendation, Nault did not respect Akaitcho's right to be heard and ignored their arguments in favour of "irrelevant information."

The Akaitcho Nation does not recognize the authority of the impact review board. As a group with an unsettled land claim they have only observer status on the board.

Sharon Venne, assistant chief negotiator with the Akaitcho, said a win will put the board's authority in question.

The Akaitcho filed a series of affidavits on March 27.

The Department of Indian and Northern Affairs would say little about the case.

"We are aware the First Nation has applied for a judicial review and because it is before the courts can't comment any further," said Mike Murphy, an Ottawa spokesperson for the department.

The department filed notice it had been served on March 8. It has 30 days to respond to the affidavits.

The Pine Point area was part of a large tract of land extending from the South Slave into Saskatchewan and Alberta that the federal government ceded it to Treaty 8 a century ago.

Patterson Sawmill offered the Fort Resolution band $20,000 -- plus $5,000 per trapper in compensation -- and jobs. The community rejected the money.