No One Charged During Test Of Metis Fishing Rights
Monday, July 14, 2008 at 15:17
A Metis leader is calling a harvesting rights demonstration on the Alberta side of Garson Lake a success — despite the fact it was essentially ignored by conservation officers.
Between 75 and 100 Metis hit the water yesterday, hoping to draw conservation officers into charging them with illegal fishing.
The Metis in Saskatchewan feel they have subsistence harvesting rights in Alberta — and want the issue settled by the courts.
However, Buffalo Narrows Metis local president Philip Chartier says not only was no one charged, conservation officers didn’t even watch.
Chartier says his group is interpreting that response as affirmation by the Alberta government that Saskatchewan Metis have harvesting rights in that province.
Alberta Sustainable Resource Development spokesman Darcy Whiteside says the Metis shouldn’t jump to conclusions — noting the site of this weekend’s protest was remote, and couldn’t be accessed by road from the Alberta side.
Whiteside also says the Alberta government deals with each Metis harvesting case on an individual basis — mainly concentrating on whether the person involved has any ancestral tie to a historical or modern day Metis community.
Chartier says a follow-up demonstration will be held on Alberta’s Gipsy Lake this winter.