By Abbie Bakan

Matthew Coon Come, the outspoken Grand Chief of the Grand Council of the Crees (Eeyou Istchee) since 1987, has recently been elected Chief of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN). What will Coon Come's leadership mean for the advancement of the rights of native peoples in Canada today?

He has come out swinging, challenging the federal government over its racist attack on native fishing rights in Burnt Church.

This should be no surprise. He has an established record of aggressive agitation on behalf of the Cree, whose land is mainly concentrated in the province of Quebec.

The traditional territory of the Cree covers about 400,000 square kilometers, most of which became part of Quebec through imperialist annexations in 1898 and in 1912.

Coon Come is the son of a trapper, educated at Trent and McGill Universities, and the winner of numerous awards for his environmental advocacy.

Coon Come's leadership of the AFN will certainly make it impossible for any level of government to ignore the struggle for native rights.

For party leaders like Gordon Campbell of the BC Liberals and Stockwell Day of the Canadian Alliance -- who stand for the most racist anti-native policies in the country today -- Matthew Coon Come's election as leader of the AFN is a very welcome kick in the teeth.

But his strategy is also contradictory. He is willing to challenge the federal state, as he has shown at Burnt Church.

But in the recent debate over the Clarity Bill, another side of Coon Come was shown, a side that is willing to support the Liberal Party of Canada as a supposed ally in the fight for native rights.

QUEBEC

The Clarity Act, originally Bill C-20, recently passed in the Senate. It is the Liberal government's attempt to deny Quebec's right to self-determination through a draconian piece of legislation.

The legislation follows on the Supreme Court's August 1998 ruling that the government of Canada would have to negotiate secession if a clear majority, based on a clear question, opted for this outcome in a Quebec referendum.

The Liberals went to the Supreme Court in the hope of using the courts to prevent a third referendum on sovereignty. The most recent referendum, in October of 1995, came within a hair's breadth of success for the sovereigntists.

In previous referendums the legality of the process was not questioned.

And the conclusion of the Supreme Court was in fact to refuse to attempt to settle the question in the courts, and to send it back to the politicians.

Now, the Clarity Act states that both the question itself and the outcome of a "clear majority" are subject to the decision of the federal Parliament.

These decisions, according to the Bill, do not rest with the Quebec electorate or their democratically elected provincial representatives.

Only after Parliamentary approval and a Constitutional amendment will terms of secession be negotiated.

The Quebec Legislative Assembly replied with a bill of their own, Bill 99, that maintained that it was only the government of Quebec that could determine the terms of unity with the rest of Canada.

In the process, the Bill also shamefully subordinates the rights of native peoples within Quebec.

In this reactionary legislative competition, the Cree justifiably responded with an aggressive reassertion of their rights. But in the process, they have given implicit support to the federal Clarity Bill.

The arguments carried by the Cree influenced the AFN, the federal native organization directly involved in the discussions of Bill C-20.

The Assembly of First Nations challenged the first rendition of the Clarity Bill because it failed to recognize the involvement of native peoples.

But when two of three proposed amendments were accepted by the Liberals, neither of which fundamentally changed the bill, then AFN Leader Phil Fontaine gave it his full backing.

An AFN press release dated March 14, 2000 states:

"We have for some time supported the spirit of Bill C-20 as a code preventing unilateral secession by a province and ensuring Clarity in any provincial secession referendum. . . . As a result of amendments to the first two clauses of the Bill . . . the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada, especially those of any province proposing secession, now join the Senate and the legislatures of the Provinces and Territories, as governmental institutions whose views both on the clarity of the question and the suitability of the majority, must be taken into account."

Matthew Coon Come and the AFN have made dangerous bedfellows with the Liberal Party of Canada. Canada is a nation with not one, but two, oppressed peoples -- natives and the Québécois.

There is no denying that the leadership of the Parti Québécois and the Bloc Québécois have recently adopted extremely reactionary positions against native rights in Quebec that must be opposed.

However, to seek allies in this struggle among the federalists in Ottawa -- as if there is any real support for native rights in these quarters -- is to play into the hands of a divide and conquer strategy that only benefits the oppressors.

How could the cause of native people's inherent right to self-determination benefit by the denial of that same right to the Quebecois?

Matthew Coon Come should look elsewhere in his struggle to advance native rights.

Many of the major trade unions and student organizations in Canada opposed the Clarity Act, and at the same time actively support the rights of both native peoples and the Québécois to self-determination.

It is among these ranks that a real alternative to this racist, oppressive, imperialist system can be forged.