30 years of negotiations ends in `freedom' for Inuit

When asked what the achievement of self-government means to the Inuit people of Canada, the Minister for Public Works, Telecommunications and Technical Services, Ms Manitok Thompson, replied simply: "It's freedom!" The Inuit number some 25,000 people, scattered in 26 recognised communities across a vast northern territory, making up 23 per cent of the country's enormous land mass.

The minister was cutting a dried Arctic char as she spoke, explaining that the fish is one of their staple foods. It is like the salmon but with a richer taste, pink or white depending on its feeding grounds - quite delicious. (The fish are still found in some mountain lakes in Ireland and Scotland, remnants of the ice age). Other staples are caribou, bear, seal, shellfish, geese and narwhal.

Hunting remains an essential part of most household budgets, whether in the capital, Iqaluit, and other towns or more isolated communities - not least because of the high cost of food brought from the south. It is a conservationist culture, environmentally protective, based on the Inuit people's survival for thousands of years in this enchantingly beautiful Arctic land, now eagerly preparing for the summer season as the snow and ice melt and the migrant birds, animals and fish arrive.

On April 1st, Nunavut - meaning "our land" in the Inuit language Inuktituk - was officially inaugurated as Canada's third territory. For the people we know traditionally as eskimos (originally an Indian word for them but not used now) this is a truly historic moment.

It is the culmination of nearly 30 years of organisation, agitation and negotiation with the Canadian authorities for self-rule and compensation for past wrongs. It brings a definitive end to colonial rule and harsh assimilationist policies that wreaked havoc with their way of life and endangered their very survival as a people and culture. It poses many challenges and opportunities to reverse the socio-economic effects of such policies with limited current means but considerable potential resources. It is also a further example of the Canadian genius for constitutional innovation, with a wider bearing on the intractable question of Quebec in years to come, as for future self-governing arrangements for the country's other aboriginal First Nations, nearly 1 million people in all.

Talking with a group of European journalists to members of the new government and legislative assembly in Iqaluit, a straggling, booming town of about 4,500 population in the south of Baffin Island, we were struck by their confidence and good humour as they begin to put self-government into effect. A legislative assembly of 19 members was elected last year by all residents of the territory, 85 per cent of them Inuits. By agreement there are no political parties and the system is based on consensus and majority voting. The assembly elected Mr Paul Okalik as premier, he proposed a cabinet with eight ministerial portfolios and the members voted them into office by secret ballot.

While formally Nunavut has the same status and powers as the Northwest and Yukon Territories, it incorporates Inuit values and beliefs in a distinctive and democratically accountable fashion suitable to their culture. The working language is Inuktitut, for debate and legislation, with simultaneous translation into other Inuit dialects, English and French.

It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the language issue. It symbolises and expresses the achievement of self-rule and will affect all sectors of the new government's work. As the Minister for Education, Mr James Arvaluk, put it in the assembly on Thursday, "we will no longer be rapped on our knuckles in school for speaking our own language".

The government is making a determined effort to decentralise administration and agencies throughout the huge territory, despite the high transport costs involved. The assembly plans to hold regular "retreats" in these areas, bringing committee meetings to the people. The members are rapidly learning that all politics are local. A sharp controversy continued this week over complaints from hunters in Gjoa Haven, 900km from Iqaluit, that the last delivery of petrol contained "bad gas" which damaged 50 of their snowmobiles. The government has had it tested several times and maintains there is nothing wrong with it. Decentralisation will strain the budget under discussion this week. It is based squarely on priorities inherited from the previous territorial government and the financial framework agreed with the federal government in Ottawa, which supplies 90 per cent of the government's income. According to an editorial in the Nunatsiaq News it lays bare "the brutal limitations that weaken Nunavut's power to govern itself".

Allocations are quite inadequate, it says, considering the backlog in providing schools and instruction, the appalling shortage of affordable housing and the extent of welfare reliance. Incomes in Nunavut are half the Canadian average, but the cost of many consumer goods is two or three times more.

The Premier, Mr Okalik, and the Minister for Finance, Mr Kelvin Ng, recognise these constraints and say it will take time to change priorities, reopen financial discussions with Ottawa and generate the wherewithal to provide supplementary streams of income by developing tourism, mining and other resources. In any case there are strict environmental constraints on such activities. The $1.1 billion (Canadian) land claims settlement agreed with Ottawa in 1993 is separately administered and will also help to boost the economy in the medium term.

There are ambitious plans for Arctic co-operation with Greenland, north Finland, north Russia and Siberia. The new government also plans to lobby the European Union to reverse its ban on seal products, which they convincingly argue heavily discriminate against a people who lack agricultural trade.

Mr Okalik and his colleagues are concerned about developments in Quebec. Were it to secede from Canada the Inuit people of northern Quebec would probably prefer to join forces with them and thereby stay in the Canadian federation. But they are also sceptical about suggestions that an Inuit become the next Canadian governor-general, saying few of their people would want to represent Queen Elizabeth.

There are three non-Inuit members of the Legislative Assembly, one of them an Irish-Canadian, Mr Kevin O'Brien, representing Arviat in the western Kivalliq region. His parents came to Nova Scotia from Cork and after graduating as an architect he moved to the territory nine years ago and was asked to stand for the assembly. Another Irishman, Mr John Quirke, is clerk of the assembly.