Mohawks assert hold on territory
Warn of roadblocks, tolls

CAMPBELL CLARK
The Gazette

The Kahnawake band council warned the federal and Quebec governments yesterday it will immediately assert its sovereignty over the South Shore reserve, taking control of highways, railways and waterways, and declaring the community a duty-free zone.

Sparked by changes to Quebec tobacco-tax laws announced last week, the band council yesterday issued a sharp reaction that amounts to a unilateral declaration of sovereignty, and a pledge to back it up by taking complete control of Kahnawake territory.

A source close to the band council said it will begin to pass its own laws to assert Mohawk control.

Highways and other arteries through Kahnawake will remain open today, the source said, but the council will begin "taxing" governments for their use - and if they don't pay, toll booths and other physical barriers will be erected.

"It means that they are going to assume control over these things," the source said. "There will be no physical change for some time. This is just putting everybody on notice."

That notice came in a letter sent yesterday by Kahnawake Grand Chief Joe Norton to Prime Minister Jean Chretien and other leaders, accompanied by a notice from the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake outlining its plans.

"We will begin our jurisdictional control over economic-development matters with attention concentrated on third-party interests in land being nationalized or taxed," the notice says. "We will also initiate user fees on our highways, waterways, railways and on utilities. We will plan a tax protest starting in Kahnawake. As part of our economic development, we will establish a duty-free zone for the territory of Kahnawake."

Norton could not be reached for comment last night.

While Norton's letter and the band council's statement recount a series of grievances with the federal and Quebec governments, it makes it clear that the immediate spark for the declaration of control was Quebec's announcement last week of new tobacco-tax laws.

Finance Minister Bernard Landry announced the province will attempt to combat the sale of tax-free cigarettes on reserves by collecting tobacco taxes through manufacturers rather than resellers. Merchants would be reimbursed later for taxes they paid on cigarettes sold to Indians. Under federal law, Indians are exempt from taxes, but both governments insist taxes must be collected by aboriginal dealers who sell to non-Indians.

In yesterday's notice, the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake blasted Quebec's tax changes as an illegal infringement of their tax-free status.

"The recent move by the province to impose taxes on our people is another example of a direct attack on the legal and aboriginal rights of First Nations peoples," the council said in the statement.

It added that attempts to resolve tax and other issues have met with little co-operation from the Quebec and federal governments.

"The attempts to limit and control our rights to the point of their extinction is tantamount to absolute assimilation and political genocide."

A spokesman for Guy Chevrette, Quebec's minister responsible for aboriginal affairs, said the government would not respond to the Kahnawake statement until today.

Kelly Ronan, an aide to federal Indian Affairs Minister Jane Stewart, did not return telephone calls last night.

In his letter to Chretien, Norton did not mince words, attacking successive governments for the "deterioration and erosion" of Mohawk land and rights, and blaming all political parties at the federal and provincial levels for using them as a "political football."

"We, the Mohawks of Kahnawake, have been denied accessibility to our traditional lands and resources that you, the Canadians and Quebecers, have grown fat, rich, and lazy on," Norton wrote.

He made specific reference to Liberal attacks on a secret tax deal signed with a Kahnawake cigarette merchant, saying, "Mr. Jean Charest and his jackals took great delight in making the Quebec government squirm at our expense."

Liberal MNA Thomas Mulcair, who led those attacks, said yesterday that his party has tried to stress that not all aboriginals or Mohawks in Kahnawake are involved in the sale of tax-free cigarettes.