In April 1999, a vast majority of the territory now held within the Northwest Territories will be passed to the Aboriginal people in the north of Canada: to become the first Aboriginal self-governed territory in Canada. Nunavut becomes the first territory to enter the Federation of Canada since Newfoundland joined in 1949. Nunavut, subject to the Canadian Constitution and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, will be a public government with all of its citizens having the same rights. But because the population will be about 85 per cent Inuit, it will reflect that reality. Long negotiations with the Northern Aboriginal people (in particular the Inuit) resulted in a treaty process to finally give them dominion over their own lands. These lands in the Keewatin and Baffin Island Territories in Canada were largely ignored until the late 20th century.

The Nunavut heartland of the eastern arctic had very few associations with the western N.W.T. until the early 1970s when administration based in Ottawa was moved to Yellowknife with development of the N.W.T. Territorial Administration. That administration had opened for business in 1967, but only concerned itself with the western area until it could digest the complications of a whole new government system. Not only had the eastern and western NWT been administered separately, but in the early 1960s both Conservative and Liberal governments had been in the process of dividing the N.W.T. to create an eastern Nunatsiaq territory.

Nothing Canadians have done has earned more awe and respect among human rights observers around the world than to begin substantial funding in the early 1970s of regional and national Indian, Metis and Inuit associations (three recognized distinct types of Aboriginal people in Canada). It took many years (and continues) for Canadian society to come to terms with matters pertaining to our Aboriginal people. One major change was to no longer call Northern Aboriginal people Eskimos (meaning flesh eaters and highly insulting to these fine people) and to begin recognizing them as Inuit (the people) which they called themselves. Up until the Charlotte Town Accord, most Canadians were unaware of the problems encountered by Aboriginal people living on and off the highly controversial reserve system implemented in Canada to contain her Aboriginal people. This accord brought to the foreground the many attrocities experienced by Aboriginal peoples. The ruminations of the Supreme Court judges in the Calder, or Nishga case, in the early 1970s were another major event, leading a Prime Minister who was the national champion against nationalist ethnocentrism to declare that the aboriginal people obviously had more particular rights that many, including himself, had thought.

The Inuit developed their organizations and proposals quickly. The strongest N.W.T. Inuit bodies were COPE (the Inuvialuit regional body) and Inuit Tapirisat of Canada (the national Canadian Inuit body) which included only three of Canada’s six Inuit regions. The others are the Inuvialuit western arctic, arctic Quebec and the north coast of Labrador. ITC had fixed its hopes on a proposal for Nunavut: a land claims settlement proposal including creation of a Nunavut territorial government. While the new Nunavut government would function as a provincial type government open to all residents, the large population majority who were Inuit could expect to dominate its life with the claims settlement reinforcing the economic, cultural and social rights of Inuit through specially created bodies controlled by Inuit.

Many Inuit claims are being settled worldwide: The COPE claim in Canada was settled in the early 1980s; Quebec Inuit settled in 1975; Alaskan Inuit in several quite different regions settled in 1971; and in Greenland (country within the Danish kingdom), an Inuit self governing body was created.

The idea to split the Northwest Territories into two new territories was first introduced as a bill in the Federal House of Commons in 1965. Some eastern Arctic residents appeared before a House of Commons committee to oppose the bill because the population had not been properly consulted. As a esult, the bill never got second reading and died on the order paper. The Fderal government wanted the issue examined further, and created the Carrothers Commission to study political development in the North and to report back to Parliament. In 1966, after holding hearings in northern communities, the three-man commission recommended that the issue of dividing the Northwest Territories be further examined in 10 years. It was almost a decade later when the Inuit started to force the issue of division onto the agenda of the Northwest Territories Legislative Assembly. The assembly was very hostile to the idea and wanted, instead, to devolve more power to the territorial government from the Federal government. The Inuit opposed this devolution of powers, insisting that the issue of division be resolved first.

While the Nunavut claims have been worked on steadily for more than a decade, the active decision to create a Nunavut government by a specific body finally occurred in 1982 following an N.W.T. wide plebiscite on division of the N.W.T. to create Nunavut. The eastern half of the N.W.T. (the Nunavut heartland) voted 90 percent for Nunavut in a record voter turnout; with 57 percent of all voters approving the division. The result so stunned observers that the vision of Nunavut could no longer be denied. Both the Yellowknife and Ottawa governments moved to make creation of Nunavut their avowed policy. The N.W.T. government created two new bodies: the Nunavut Constitutional Forum and the Western Constitutional Forum; to carry out the work of devising new governments for the east and west. These bodies contain Members of the Legislative Assembly elected from each area, plus the leaders of Aboriginal associations in the area. Each Forum is itself representative of the social and political realities of the two halves of the N.W.T.

The Aboriginal organizations funded by Ottawa changed the character of the north and of Canada. In the N.W.T. they were the first aboriginal public bodies that could and did tackle the issues of the people. These bodies became rallying points for aboriginal opinion. These organizations provided work and greater opportunities for social and political action. Ottawa recognised the political legitimacy of these organizations and great care was taken to balance their interests and those of governing bodies. Ottawa through the Trudeau and Clark government years played a role of active neutrality: its goal was to secure a social, economic and political development in the north which would provide equality between aboriginal northerners and the newer arrival. In particular, Ottawa resisted the Territorial government's attempts to secure devolution of powers and budgets, seeing clearly that these would consolidate the position of, and otherwise benefit, the whites while largely leaving Aboriginal northerners aside.

The turning point in the north occurred in October, 1989 with an election that swept into oblivion the older white leaders who had insisted on a north modelled on the south, with politics and economy on their hands; who had opposed aboriginal rights, claims settlements, and political and institutional adjustments for aboriginal people, while seeing in massive resource development the hopes for their business community. A new group was elected, consisting of younger whites who recognised the need to accommodate the interests of their aboriginal fellow citizens and young aboriginal leaders themselves. They met in special session at once and reversed most of the major politics on Aboriginal rights and constitutional issues of preceding legislators. They set up a special committee on N.W.T. “unity” with the committee quickly announcing that neither the present borders nor the present administration of the N.W.T. were meaningful to most residents, especially the aboriginal residents.

This new government in the north worked diligently to speak to exclusively northern issues, combining the best from the south and the special needs of Aboriginal and non Aboriginal people living in a hostile, poverty stricken north. The main task of this governing body is service delivery through the involvement of the people who actually live in the north. Nunavut is a process supported by the majority of the Aboriginal people: who we must never forget are the majority in the north. This change in the governing representatives has brought about the need for a government of consensus rather than of political party. Each elected representative has an equal standing in the governing of the north: with no political parties dictating the direction of their decisions.

The Nunavut Constitutional Forum (NCF) began its work in August, 1982. The committee began by preparing historical documents on the evolution of the Nunavut concept, followed by studies of major issues such as the Federal/Nunavut division of powers and fiscal relations, and concluding with a comprehensive proposal for government in Nunavut. Hearings were then held throughout the north, with the committee establishing immediately the intended openness of the talks, by providing interested individuals (including the press) with all available information. The committee realized as well that nothing would change in the north if the south was not included and, therefore, began a campaign in the south as well. Meetings were frequent in 1983 and 1984, and work intense. In late 1983 tours of Keewatin and Baffin region communities, and then Central Arctic communities, took place, with the Western Arctic Inuvialuit communities visited in the first half of 1984.

These tours yielded many important issues:

Two major challenges have threatened the creation of Nunavut:

Meanwhile, the idealogy of Inuit in proposing Nunavut and of other Canadian aboriginal peoples, especially in the more northern (and more intact) areas has come down with rare authority from an international report. The World Commission on Environment and Development, the “Brundtland Commission”, in its 1987 report states unequivocally that unless the governments of the world follow its proposals, life on this planet will be nasty, brutish and short. In a section on aboriginal homelands it says that where such benign relationships of intact nature and indigenous peoples living harmoniously with them are found, aboriginal systems of ecological management and adaptation must be reinforced and wider political control (“empowering”) vested in aboriginal peoples. The words in this moving passage sound like those which Canadian Inuit have been using matter of factly for years. With some 75% of Canada’s land area remaining as relatively intact nature with aboriginal peoples the main occupants of this nonurban space, the Brundtland report is obviously speaking to Canadians.

The Canadian North shares many characteristics with the foreign North. Among aboriginal peoples such as Alaskan Inuit and Indians; Greenlandic Inuit and Laplanders (the Sami), or among the indigenous European populations of Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Shetland: the same emerging identities with their political and cultural imperatives, and demands for the safeguarding of northern economic assets traditional to these peoples, are observable. Canada shares patterns with a wider north, and if Canadians were more aware of this it might be easier to develop realistic policies in and for the north. The Inuit have been leaders in developing contact and sharing experience with the foreign North through the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, a permanent body now headquartered in Canada. We must respect the abilities of these people.

Through thousands of hours of talk and questioning and listening, Inuit have developed a general consensus on what kind of public services and institutions would best meet their needs, what territory they believe belong to them and what kind of governing body they wish to implement into their lives. With Nunavut in the east and a new constitution in the west which would include special cultural and regional features for Inuvialuit, Dene and Metis peoples, Canada can forge ahead as the internationally recognized human rights advocate. Canadian history teaches that the gradual maturing of territories into provinces has been an essential part of the growth of Canada. Canadians must recognise the distinctive character of the North’s regions: the Northwest Territories, the Yukon, the Denendeh and Nunavut; and build systems which accommodate and celebrate these cultural and regional characteristics.

Nunavut is the first step Canada is taking to finally come to terms with fair dealing and fair devolution of powers back to her Aboriginal people. Too many years and too many attrocities have occurred for Canada to continue to drag her feet in this area. The Supreme Court of Canada, not to mention the World Court and World Community, have settled the issue of the rights of Aboriginal people to have atonomy of person and their land, but have stated unequivocally that the time is NOW to right the wrongs of the past and to move on to the future with Canadians and Aboriginal people working together, equally, to create a much more workable Canada.

**NOTE:  Much of the information above was gleened from articles in the © The Northern Review and Peter Jull, 1997 and earlier.