FSIN Says Ahenakew Remembered As Brave Leader

FSIN Says Ahenakew Remembered As Brave Leader

Monday, March 15, 2010 at 14:31

 

 

The funeral for former Aboriginal leader David Ahenakew will take place tomorrow afternoon on the Ahtahkakoop First Nation.

 

He died on Friday after a long battle with cancer.

 

Ahenakew served as chief of what is now the FSIN for 10 years, beginning in 1968.

 

In 1982, he became chief of the Assembly of First Nations — an organization he helped found years earlier.

 

Ahenakew is also credited with helping establish the Saskatchewan Indian Cultural Centre and the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College, which is now the FNUC.

 

Before getting into politics, Ahenakew served in the Canadian army for 16 years, and saw action in the Korean War.

 

He achieved the rank of sergeant, and in 1984, he was awarded “The Canadian Decoration” for distinguished service and good conduct.

 

In recent years, Ahenakew has made headlines over anti-Semitic remarks he made to a newspaper reporter.

 

Those comments cost him his membership in the Order of Canada, but he was acquitted last year of wilfully promoting hatred.

 

But Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations Chief Guy Lonechild says Ahenakew “will be remembered as a brave leader who dared to stand up for our rights as First Nations peoples”.

 

In a release, the FSIN says Ahenakew’s passion and oratory skill played a critical role in the entrenchment of Aboriginal and treaty rights in the Constitution of Canada in 1982, adding that Ahenakew was one of the first to assert First Nations rights to self-government at the First Ministers Constitutional Conference in 1984.

 

Ahenakew’s funeral will take place at the Ahtahkakoop band hall tomorrow at 1:00 p.m.