People Join Together to Bring Awareness to Land Disputes in Akwesasne

In what was supposed to be a “Rally” to bring awareness to the number of land disputes in Akwesasne turned into a planning session. Key people at the session were disappointed, but not discouraged by the lack of support shown on Monday, October 8, 2013 at the crossing on Kawhenoke. According to sources there are at least over 200 unresolved land disputes in the northern portion of Akwesasne. In a complicated and convoluted system created by Indian Affairs to handle land transfers, land grants, and land willed, the system becomes even more complicated by residents who are unanswered about certain papers and documents that must be filed and processed in a specified time and manner.

Beverly Pyke, one of several organizers of the rally mentioned how the process of land and registration and transfer of land titles could be handled and should be handled in Akwesasne; instead many cases go unresolved for years if not decades. For one family, it has cost them dearly, having paid over one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in legal fees and countless arguments that have torn apart a family, brought untold distress, and should have been taken care of in Akwesasne. Instead as cases go unresolved, the case eventually lands in the Federal court system. And if you find your case in provincial court first, you’re in the wrong court system and you are still responsible for court costs. All land dispute cases must been heard in front of a Federal court and only then can be turned down to a lower court. To file a dispute, you have only 60 days after the transfer, unlike the two year filing time for off reserve disputes.

“If land disputes were handled in a respectable and accountable manner in Akwesasne, many land disputes would not have to go out and to a Federal court. In fact all land disputes should be handled in house, why we would profess to want or aspire to “Self Government” when we cannot even take care of our own land disputes here at home. Isn’t that the first step in “Self Government”, is to take care of our own problems instead of letting the Federal government handle our land affairs”, stated one organizer who wanted to remain anonymous. He went on to state, “With over 200 land disputes in Akwesasne why aren’t more people here at the rally? We want answers, we want resolution. I don’t want to go to an outside court. What does that show to outsiders? That we can’t take care of our own problems?”

Land and land ownership was once viewed by Haudenosaunee people as two distinct and separate things. Land ownership was a foreign and alien concept. We once held a relationship with the living earth, both spiritual and physical, and it is the reason we have a distinct aboriginal culture, it is the reason we exist as Onkwehonweh. Once alienated from the natural world we become consumers and the earth is merely another commodity. Without the benefit of traditional knowledge we don’t have to be concerned about the rights of others, we have to consider the rights of those whose faces are standing in front of us in confrontation. That is when the Ohenton Karihwatehkwen becomes just a prayer and the ceremonies mere rituals. When our leaders recite the Ohenton Kariwatehkwen it is a call to act to protect those very elements we acknowledge as essential to our well being, our land. From the Ohenton Karihwatehkwen to land disputes in Canadian Federal Court, clearly there is work to be done in Akwesasne by all to respectfully resolve these land disputes.