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The leader of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) believes Canada’s premiers are starting to get the message.
“I think that they’re realizing that nothing’s going to get built in any province if they don’t work with First Nations people. Full stop,” National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak said in an interview on Tuesday afternoon following a meeting with premiers in Charlottetown.
“It’s no longer going to be accepted from any of us to be just left out of the economy anymore.”
Some Indigenous leaders met with provincial and territorial leaders on the margins of this year’s Council of the Federation meeting in Prince Edward Island, but concerns remain with the list of invitees and Indigenous leaders’ level of participation.
For Woodhouse-Nepinak, whose AFN advocates for chiefs countrywide, the Charlottetown meeting was positive but mostly a stepping stone toward a fall first ministers meeting with First Nations where Prime Minister Mark Carney promised chiefs they would set the agenda.
“They’ve left us out of these conversations for far too long and it’s about time that First Nations are part of the table,” she said.
President Victoria Pruden of the Métis National Council, which represents Métis governments in Alberta and Ontario following the withdrawal of its Manitoba, Saskatchewan and B.C. members, also said the meeting was positive but “a missed opportunity” to fully include Indigenous Peoples as partners in Confederation.
“You’ve got maybe five, 10 minutes to press your point and today premiers had to rush out to meet with the prime minister, I believe. And it’s not enough time for meaningful engagement,” she said in an interview.
“And so was it a success? We had a few small successes, I would say. But could it have been better? Absolutely.”
Her main message to the premiers was “we’re not hitting quite the right formula yet with major projects and Indigenous economic reconciliation.”
Pruden is urging Carney to call another series of major project summits with Indigenous Peoples, as he did last summer, holding three meetings with First Nations, Inuit and Métis leaders respectively.
The Manitoba Métis Federation boycotted that meeting, however, over the inclusion of the Métis Nation of Ontario and spoke out again about the federation’s exclusion on Tuesday.
“We weren’t invited, which is an ongoing hole in Confederation and the national dialogue of Canada,” President David Chartrand said in an emailed statement.
“They should realize by now that strategizing against a tyrant man, Trump, who believes he should be king, needs all united together.”
Meanwhile Inuit leaders were unable to attend the Council of the Federation meeting as they’re in Iqaluit for an Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC) assembly, alongside Inuit from Greenland, Alaska and Russia, a spokesperson for national organization Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) said by email.
ITK boycotted last year’s premiers’ meeting in Ontario due to the inclusion of “organizations that represent fraudulent collectives that falsely claim to represent Inuit.” ITK President Natan Obed also declined to attend in 2023 over the inclusion of non-rights-holding groups.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war and renewed tariff threats cast a shadow over the meeting in Charlottetown and also set the stage for the ICC meeting in Iqaluit.
The U.S. president’s threats to annex Greenland and friction with the NATO military alliance coupled with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have raised the prospect of another Cold War-style militarization of the Arctic.
Carney last month promised “full partnership” with Inuit as Canada embarks on major defence and infrastructure investments to shore up the country’s sovereignty, after Obed suggested Inuit might look to foreign partners if their relationship with Ottawa deteriorates.
