Finding our Voices

Some older people had been in their teens
when the treaty party came to their village
in 1921. They had first-hand memories of the
promises, not stories or rumours. When the
government said we had given up our land,
they were shocked. They said: 'We would
never surrender our land.'

When the oil companies moved in, the
communities were not consulted. Projects
went ahead without any input from us.
People would come to me as Chief and say:
"A bulldozer ran over my trapline."

Q. How did the Dene respond to those
changes?

Another factor was leadership. Up to then,
the spiritual leader was the priest, the
economic leader was the Bay manager, and
justice was the RCMP. They were running
the communities the way they saw fit.

That had to change. We couldn't ask any
more: 'Please give us this or that.' We had
to demand our rights."

Q. What did people think when Judge
Berger arrived in their communities?

Tom Berger made Dene people feel
comfortable. If a community wanted a
hearing in a camp, he'd say: "Let's go."

He was happy with silence. For aboriginal
people, that is a gift.

Q. What was the response at the
community hearings?

Dene people responded. Willow Lake is a
camp where lots of Tulita people went for
the spring hunt. For the hearing they put
up a big tent, fresh spruce boughs on the
ground, a little table for Berger.

Fred Willow, an elderly man at that time,
said: "The land is like my mother. If I am
hungry, she gives me a rabbit."

At the Tulita hearing I spoke as Chief, the
settlement manager spoke, and then nobody
said anything. I thought: this man came all
this way to hear us and we've got nothing
to say.

All of a sudden, from the back of the
room came Grannie Clement, all five foot
nothing of her, walking down the aisle,
singing a Dene love song. After that, things
picked up.

During the Berger Inquiry, we Dene people
found our voices.