Features

The leadership of the Dehcho First Nations have a difficult decision ahead of them.

The decision concerns the future of Grand Chief Herb Norwegian's role in the Dehcho First Nations (DFN).

Norwegian pleaded guilty to a charge of assault in territorial court on Dec. 11 and was subsequently convicted.

The charge arose from an incident on Nov. 11, 2007, and involved a woman. According to court records the assault involved a backhanded slap across the victim's face.

When Norwegian appeared in court in Fort Simpson he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to one day in jail, 50 hours of community service and six months of probation.

While Norwegian's court case has finished, the ramifications of the conviction are just beginning to ripple out across the Deh Cho.

On Dec. 13 a teleconference call was held where chiefs and elders of the Dehcho First Nations discussed what their next step would be. A subsequent teleconference call on Dec. 17 has lead to the calling of a special assembly to discuss and review Norwegian's leadership.

As leaders prepare for the assembly that will be held at the end of January they have to dwell on some heavy topics. The question for the leadership is how his conviction affects Norwegian's position as grand chief. Should Norwegian be allowed to continue in his role?

At the core of this issue is the question of what criteria a chief or grand chief has to be measured against.

Everyone knows that being a leader can be a difficult role.

The difficulties of the position narrow down the number of people who want to hold it.

What standards should the remaining candidates be held to? If Norwegian is allowed to continue as grand chief what kind of message will be sent out to the membership? Is assaulting someone permissible behaviour?

If an example is not set in this case what other actions will the leadership be willing to accept in a grand chief? Where will the line be drawn?

The same question will arise if the leadership punishes Norwegian. If assault isn't all right what other crimes will bar a person from being a leader?

There is then the question of how many people will be left with clean enough histories if a list is created.

In making their decision the leadership will have to be very aware of the precedent they are setting. Once they open the door on the behaviour and history of chiefs they'd better know how far it will be allowed to swing either way.

Setting out a clear set of criteria for both chiefs and grand chiefs across the Deh Cho would be beneficial. The criteria would serve to warn people about the actions that would bar their advancement in leadership and may make potential candidates think twice in the future.

I walked into Samuel Hearne on Friday afternoon only expecting a good entertaining hockey game. Instead, I got a lot more from my visit.

A group of Grade 10 students were in the library with the Turtle Concepts group. I eased my way into the corner of the room so I could watch what was going on.

From the first few minutes, I could recognize that something unique was going on.

A complete stranger to our school and community was encouraging our youth to speak to one another about compliments.

At first, the compliments seemed to fall on deaf ears, but once the trust was built, it wasn't too long before people were laughing with each other and smiling.

Seeing all this positive re-enforcement of these students was different for me. They all broke character and showed this writer that there is hope for the young people in our town.

If the older generations of our community had workshops like this one, I'm sure that things would be different.

Not to say that the school was an overly-negative place to begin with, but we can't deny a problem when it looks us right in the face and asks for our lunch money.

Bullying isn't limited to the confines of the school yard. Each and every day we are faced with challenges from our peers. Peer pressure is one of the simplest forms of bullying.

Students released their inner-most emotions and shared their common fears with each other.

Even the staff were given a lecture about youth in society today. After talking with a few members of the faculty, I'd say that whole school took a good lesson from their guests last week.

The week-long battery of discussions and presentations paid off in ways that we won't recognize until years from now.

With each session, more and more youth were able to break free of the chains of limited emotions that have held down generations of people in this community.

Turtle Concepts really showed Samuel Hearne a thing or two about self healing.

You can only be healthy from within, once you can let go of the hate you have for the people around you.

Students were urged to talk with each other about their negative emotions. Somehow, that man and his concepts about a healthy life changed the usual library into a room of change.

I've been through that school and remember some of the past troubles I had with my peers there.

Granted I probably didn't make it easy for some to like me, but there was always someone who felt the need to pick on me for some reason.

I grew to resent some of the people in my life. Having bad feelings like that is not something that is easy to admit, but I have learned to let go and take them at face value.

Like Dave told me, you have to accept people for what they are, not for what they have done.

If a bully has made your life miserable, don't hold that against them, instead, embrace the good things going for them.

Demonstrate that it's worth it to change your life in a positive way.

In a Letter to the Editor in last Friday's Yellowknife, Paul Huard went right to the heart of the debate over regulating the taxi industry - Why do it?

Cities and towns, first in Europe and later in North America, have been regulating the taxi business for over 300 years. Historically, the wealthy were more likely to use taxis. Regulation was a way of ensuring quality, which would also be good for impressing visiting business people and tourists.

Regulation suited taxi companies seeking shelter from competition and allowed owners a higher rate of return than they might get without it.

In Yellowknife, a significant number of taxi drivers want regulations to reduce the number of cabs that can be on the road.

They say they cannot make a living if there are too many.

A significant number of other drivers, some of whom want into the business as car owners, and at least one cab company owner are against it.

Yellowknife's city council is wrestling with these complex issues. They narrowly voted to temporarily cap the number of taxis until September 2008.

Letter writer Huard answered his own question, pointing out that no other free enterprise profession is regulated by city hall, so taxi owners/drivers shouldn't be either.

We agree. Greater regulation too often results in less competition, less efficiency, poorer service.

The city should only concern itself with public safety and the placement of taxi stands on city streets.

Anything more and what one councillor called "a long-standing problem," will only persist.

Liberal leader Stephane Dion's promise to base search planes in Yellowknife and Iqaluit should his party be elected is welcome.

Following a 2001 plane crash near Fort Good Hope in which four people died, former NWT chief coroner Percy Kinney was troubled by the time it took for search and rescue aircraft to reach the North from bases in Winnipeg and Trenton, Ont.

At least three of the people on board survived the initial impact but perished in the cold after it took 30 hours for a Hercules rescue plane with parachutists on board to arrive at the crash site. A coroner's jury called for the Department of Defence to allocate planes and personnel to the North so the territories weren't so reliant on aircraft from the south.

Despite the smaller populations of the NWT and Nunavut, there are generally more plane crashes in the North than in all the Atlantic provinces, plus Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Unfortunately, it's hard to take Dion's pledge seriously considering that pleas for more northern search and rescue resources fell on deaf ears while his party was in power.

In reality, Dion comes across as a Johnny-come-lately.

His December visit comes months after the Conservatives and NDP ventured north to outline their plans to improve Arctic infrastructure and development.

If the Liberals are to be taken seriously by NWT residents, they had best find a candidate to take up the Northern cause.

Right now all we have is a targeted election promise tainted by a dismal Liberal record of ignoring the North.

While we dislike ending the year on an off note, the situation at the Nunavut Business Credit Corp. has become so surreal, it's simply impossible to ignore.

In fact, the debacle has transcended being an embarrassment to the Government of Nunavut (GN) to become a downright threat to its credibility.

Who would have thought we'd ever see the day when former prime minister Brian Mulroney and former Nunavut finance minister David Simailak would have so much in common?

Yet here we are, listening to them claim ignorance and serious errors of judgment concerning large amounts of money they were both responsible for overseeing.

At least Simailak wasn't receiving large amounts of money in a gym bag from a shady character in a cheap motel room.

That was probably small consolation to Simailak as he tendered his resignation to Premier Paul Okalik this past week – a move the former minister had little choice in making.

But the script to this dime-store novel doesn't end there.

Nunavummiut can prepare themselves for more excuses, I mean explanations from the powers that be, when the acting chief-executive officer (CEO) of the Nunavut Business Credit Corp. steps up to face fraud charges levied against him during his time working with Eskimo Point Lumber Supply in Arviat.

In fact, Allan McDowell was hired to his position as acting CEO of the credit corp. despite the fact the Arviat charges were already on the books against him.

After a few adjournments and a failure to appear, McDowell will finally stand before the bench in Arviat on Jan. 28.

You can't mop floors for the GN if you have a criminal record, but that same standard doesn't seem to apply to being a member of the assembly or being put in charge of millions of dollars.

So, the GN's crack Human Resources department hires a CEO who allegedly defrauded Eskimo Point Lumber Supply, and stole cheques and a laptop from his Arviat employer in 2005.

Now, make no mistake about it, everyone is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

But is this the kind of resume that usually lands a person a CEO's position in a Crown corporation?

Do high-powered executives not have to supply references like those of us who work for a living?

More to the point, does anyone in this government actually read resumes or bother to check references?

It couldn't possibly be the same person in charge of reading the credit corp.'s monthly financial statements for the past few years, could it?

The job of cleaning up the mess exposed by auditor general Sheila Fraser now falls to new Finance Minister Louis Tapardjuk, and we don't envy him the task.

But, on the bright side, if countless hours in the office working on the matter begin to bring him down, Tapardjuk can always go home and watch reruns of the Brian and David Show to brighten up his dreary days.

And he even has a new episode to look forward to on Jan. 28.

Now, heeerrrre's Allan!

An error appeared in article in last Wednesday's Yellowknifer ( Composer, kids debut tonight," Dec. 12). The names of composers Eric Whitacre and John Rutter were misspelled.

Also, in Friday's Yellowknifer ("Search and rescue planes proposed for North," Dec. 14) Western Arctic MP Dennis Bevington's press release stated 24-hour coverage of the North would require six Hercules aircraft, not two, as was reported. Yellowknifer apologizes for any embarrassment or confusion caused by the errors.