Yellowknife (Jun 05/06) - Most former residential school students will likely begin seeing their share of a $1.9 billion federal settlement in March 2007, the head of the Assembly of First Nations announced last week.

Assembly of First Nations Grand Chief Phil Fontaine announced Thursday most former residential school survivors will likely get their share of a $1.9 billion settlement from Ottawa beginning next March. - Andrew Raven/NNSL photo The deal Breakdown of the $2.2 billion settlement package for former residential schools students. $1.9 billion in so-called common experience payments for all former students. This includes a $10,000 lump sum plus $3,000 for each year at the schools. $60 million for a truth commission designed to document the history of residential schools. $20 million to commemorate the residential school legacy. Communities could use the money to build memorials, museums etc. $125 million for the Aboriginal Healing Foundation, which sponsors counselling programs across the country.

The deal, first announced in May 2005, still needs final approval from courts in nine provinces and territories, Grand Chief Phil Fontaine said Thursday in Yellowknife.

Once that happens, some of the estimated 80,000 former students will have six months to decide whether or not to accept the settlement, which includes a $10,000 lump-sum payment plus $3,000 for each year.

"This agreement is fair. It's generous," Fontaine told several hundred people at Yellowknife's Explorer Hotel, among them aboriginal leaders from across the NWT.

"This is a wonderful, wonderful moment for all of us."

Fontaine was in the capital to answer questions and promote the deal, which appears far from final.

If over 5,000 former students opt-out of the package and decide to sue the federal government in court, the deal could be scuttled, Fontaine said.

While most former students are still at least nine months away from seeing their cheques. Fontaine said an advance was handed out Monday to one elder, the first person to be compensated under the deal.

Former students over 65 are eligible for an $8,000 up-front payment and Fontaine said there are 4,000 such applications pending.

Meanwhile, the national leader warned that some lawyers have been charging elders to help them file their claim.

Fontaine said this is unnecessary thanks to the streamlined application form.

"There are lawyers out there who are trolling for clients," he said. "There is no need to pay a penny."

Reports out of Manitoba suggested con-artists have already gone onto several reservations in an attempt to fleece elders but to date that has not been a problem in the Northwest Territories, AFN regional vice chief, Bill Erasmus said.

The AFN estimates over 150,000 aboriginals attended residential schools across Canada from the late 1800s to the early 1970s.

The schools, designed to instruct first nations children in the Western tradition, were renowned for their sometimes brutal treatment of students.

There are between 6,000 and 8,000 former students in the NWT, which was home to nine schools.