The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.
MOOSE FACTORY – Mushkegowuk First Nations are hosting a three-day conference this week to discuss the future of Treaty No. 9. This comes on the heels of a court challenge that has been launched by Mushkegowuk council earlier this month.
The dispute is over Aboriginal land rights and traplines in the Cochrane area where there has been increased mining activity. Mushkegowuk is using as legal leverage a 108-year-old diary that belonged to Daniel MacMartin, the Ontario treaty commissioner who negotiated Treaty No. 9 in 1905.
Much fanfare was made by Mushkegowuk when the diary was discovered a couple of years ago. It was felt MacMartin’s diary reaffirms the view that Aboriginal leaders were duped into signing a written treaty which they did not fully understand.
“When my grandfather signed the treaty in Fort Albany in 1905, the terms as discussed and orally agreed to, were very clear,” said Grand Chief Stan Louttit. “It was a sacred oral agreement about living together and sharing the land.
“The Omushkego (people of Mushkegowuk) never surrendered the land or the natural resources but were told their rights would be protected.”