Struggle for democracy continues in North.

Windspeaker Staff Writer

YELLOWKNIFE

A Supreme Court decision is spurring the government of the Northwest Territories to change the number of seats in its Legislative Assembly.

The Supreme Court challenge was launched in March by a group called the Friends of Democracy. The group challenged the constitutionality of the number of seats in the assembly saying that certain constituencies in the Northwest Territories were under-represented, particularly Yellowknife and Hay River.

The challenge came after additional seats were recommended from a commission that reviewed the electoral boundaries. The recommendations were debated and defeated in the assembly. Three Members of the Legislative Assembly from Yellowknife sided with the Friends of Democracy in the challenge.

"They were looking at the number of people in each riding. Ideally, according to the British democratic system, which we follow, its representation by population. But in the North, we are saying it is different because some of our ridings are so far apart and there is fewer people that we should have less people represented by less MLAs," said Premier Jim Antoine.

Justice de Weerdt ruled in favor of the Friends of Democracy on March 5, stating the two ridings in Yellowknife and the Hay River riding were invalid because the population in each of the districts is more than 25 per cent higher than the average population of the other ridings.

As part of his ruling the Supreme Court Justice gave the Legislative Assembly until April 1 to make changes to amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act to comply with Section 3 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. An extension to comply was granted to Sept. 1.

"A big concern came up that there will be a shift in power from the small communities to the large communities and a shift in power from Aboriginal control to non-Aboriginal control. It's a major power shift there and Aboriginal people have a problem with that," said Antoine.

Before the official split of the territories on April 1, when the eastern Arctic became Nunavut, the population was primarily Aboriginal. After the split, however, the western Arctic population changed.

"[Aboriginal people] are not the majority anymore," said Friends of Democracy president Robert Slaven. "The population now is 48 per cent Native and 52 per cent non-Native, so they have some understandable concerns that a public government that's strictly representative-based could swamp them," said Slaven.

Intervenors in the court challenge were the Metis Nation, the Dene Nation, the North Slave Metis Alliance and the Lutsel k'e Dene Band, who argued that changes to the electoral boundaries endangers Section 25 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which says "The guarantee ... of certain rights and freedoms shall not be construed so as to abrogate or derogate from any Aboriginal, treaty or other rights or freedoms that pertain to the Aboriginal peoples of Canada, and also Section 35 (3) of the Constitution, which deals with Aboriginal treaty rights and includes "rights that now exist by way of land claims agreements or may be so acquired."

The intervenors argued that the 14 seats in the assembly should be maintained until self government and land claim agreements are settled, but Justice de Weerdt rejected their arguments.

"The judge threw the intervenors case out. I guess he was trying to figure out how treaty and Aboriginal rights are going to be affected in the territorial elections. Their lawyers didn't have sufficient arguments," said Antoine.

The 14 MLAs met and the general consensus was not to appeal, said Antoine. Antoine said the government would support the intervenors morally and financially if they wanted to appeal.

The general consensus is that government would comply with the ruling, said Antoine, and Bill 15 was conceived.

There is a 14-seat legislative assembly in the North, but with Bill 15 about to become law, the number of seats in the assembly will jump to 19. The Bill will add three more seats to Yellowknife to give the capital city seven, and will add another each in Hay River and in Inuvik.

Bill 15 has gone through first and second readings. The standing committee of government operations, which is made up of MLAs, has 120 days to deal with it, said Antoine.

By the end of July the committee will have gone to the different communities in the North to get input on Bill 15.

"It's a bitter pill and it's a shift in power. The committee is making its way through communities to get people to understand this Bill," said Antoine. The Bill could have been put through the assembly, but Antoine's style of government is built on co-operation, he said.