Yellowknife (Mar 21/03) - It only took one day for the Yukon's newest government leader, Dennis Fentie, to get into Premier Stephen Kakfwi's good books.

Premier Kakfwi

"Fentie actually phoned me the day after he was elected (November 2002)," said Kakfwi. "So right from the very first day he wanted to do this (establish a pan-territorial dialogue).

"It was something quite frankly I would've liked to have seen from Premier Pat Duncan when she was in office. She was much closer to the governor of Alaska than she was with myself. She put all her cards on that table."

The era of goodwill towards each others' territories was only strengthened after the two joined ranks with Nunavut Premier Paul Okalik last month in walking out of health accord negotiations with the federal government.

The move secured an additional $60 million in health care funding for the three territories after a successful meeting with Prime Minister Jean Chretien two weeks later.

Last week, the love-in continued with the two premiers signing a memorandum of understanding, offering the Yukon's support for a Mackenzie Valley Pipeline and an invitation to businesses and migrant workers from the territory to come work in the resource rich NWT.

"There's no reason why we can't see if there's any way we can get Yukoners to come over and take jobs in the diamond business," said Kakfwi.

"There's people in Alberta and Saskatchewan working at BHP and Diavik, two weeks-in/two weeks-out, so those are the things we're going to look at.

"We're trying to do something together to try and maximize benefits in the North."

The premier said the MOU was only the beginning in a new era of NWT-Yukon relations, which emphasizes an East-West dialogue over North-South.

He said the territories will now collaborate on the proposed Mackenzie Valley Pipeline, which Kakfwi promises will bring jobs and money to both territories. It was a hard sell under Pat Duncan's watch, who favoured an Alaskan Highway route.

Now that Fentie is in power, all the previous animosity between the two territorial governments has evaporated.

"These are our neighbours, Nunavut and Yukon," said Kakfwi. "We're all North of 60, it creates a very special relationship... We're a tough adventurous people and this is all part of the Great Northern adventure."