SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Noonee Sanspariel, Alfred Baillargeon, and Liza Pieper were elected to fill three Dettah Yellowknives band councillor positions in a midterm byelection on Tuesday.

They will serve two-year terms, said Lynda Comerford, the returning officer of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation elections.

According to Comerford, voter turnout "wasn't as good as the chief election (in Ndilo) - there's usually fewer people for the councillors."

Five candidates ran for the councillor positions. Polls drew 470 votes, 114 of which went to Sanspariel, 109 to Baillargeon, and 99 to Pieper. Finishing at the bottom of the polls were Mary Rose Sundberg and Barbara Powless-Labelle, who has a long history of controversy associated with her band council candidacy.

Powless-Labelle was acclaimed to band in a June 2005 byelection. In November of 2006 she was not only ejected from council, but had her band membership revoked as well - which was later amended as a "banishment" from the community.

Powless-Labelle told Yellowknifer in 2006 that she was banished for asking too many questions about band finances - particularly to do with mine impact benefit agreement payments to band members.

According to Peter Liske, who was Dettah chief at the time, the banishment was ordered because Powless-Labelle was angry and confrontational when dealing with other politicians, as well as chiefs.

The former councillor was reinstated in the Yellowknives Dene band in February 2008 by way of an out-of-court settlement, made after she filed a lawsuit against the band in federal court.

Her banishment was revoked, but if she planned on running for councillor again, her candidacy had to be approved by the sitting band council.

Powless-Labelle drew 63 votes in Tuesday's election - the lowest of the bunch. Sundberg had 85 votes.