The Canadian Press reports, “The hereditary chiefs of the Gitxsan First Nations served notice Thursday to CN Rail, logging companies and sport fishermen to leave their territory along the Skeena River in a dispute with the federal and provincial governments over treaty talks. …Gitxsan have given companies operating on their land until Aug. 4 to leave the 33,000 square kilometres of their territory along the Skeena River. Because the band was not consulted by government, the companies the governments licensed are trespassing, said Gwaans Bev Clifton Percival, chief negotiator for the Gitxsan.”
“It was Gitxsan hereditary chief Delgamuukw whose 1997 legal victory recognized aboriginal title to unceded land in B.C. The band has tried since then to negotiate with the Crown but hasn’t made any progress, Clifton Percival said. A short-term forestry agreement with the province expired in 2011 and there’s been none since, she said. Then in 2012, lands awarded to the Gitxsan in an earlier court ruling were included in a treaty agreement-in-principle with the neighbouring Kitsumkalum and Kitselas nations, she said.”
“In January 2012, a deal between the Gitxsan and Enbridge over its proposed Northern Gateway pipeline collapsed.” Earlier this week, the Terrace Standard reported, “The Gitxsan now say they want no further work done on planned natural gas pipelines that would pass through their territory toward planned liquefied natural gas plants around Prince Rupert and at Kitimat. This would have an affect on the ability of three proposed pipelines to proceed in their area including the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission project by TransCanada, Westcoast Connector project by Spectra Energy and the Pacific Northern Gas looping project.”
Clifton Percival says, “B.C. has been silent yet they want to have all this activity on Gitxsan land, so we need to get their attention and this is the only way the chiefs saw forward.”
Further reading
Gitxsan Hereditary Chiefs congratulate the Tsilhqot’in Nation
WIN! Supreme Court rules in favour of Tsilhqot’in title!
