STEPHEN RICCIO
PONTIAC Dec. 16, 2020
Longtime outspoken activist and political candidate Roger Fleury took part in what he called a “cultural hunt” from Dec. 4-8, despite cries of illegitimacy from a local Indigenous leader.
Fleury told THE EQUITY that the hunt went quite well and that he intends to . . .
make it a tradition going forward. The hunt was open to all people, Indigenous and non-Indigenous.
Verna Polson, Grand Chief of the Algonquin Anishinabeg Nation Tribal Council — a government recognized body which includes within it the Kitigan Zibi reserve — released a statement on Dec. 4 denouncing the words and actions of Fleury, who she said “pretends to be a First Nation member when he is not in order to appropriate aboriginal rights.”
“Mr. Fleury has no Aboriginal rights or title that allows him to claim that the lands of Pontiac or elsewhere are his,” Polson said in the statement. “These lands are those of the Anishinabe and while it is true that they have never been ceded, sold or abandoned, Mr. Fleury is not part of this nation.”
Fleury contends that he is of Indigenous heritage, claiming he was born in Montcerf, which is just north of Kitigan Zibi, to Indigenous parents before being adopted to a white family as a boy.
Fleury identifies himself as the Chief of the Pontiac Anishinaabek Fort de Coulonge Kichesiprini, a group that he claimed has roughly 500 members. It is not recognized by the provincial or federal governments as an Indigenous nation.
While he said that he has had run-ins with Polson in the past, he didn’t directly respond to all of her claims.
“What we’re saying is, ‘Let’s work together,’” he said.
He said that a past statement from MP Will Amos recognized that the MRC Pontiac is on unceded Algonquin territory, and therefore the hunt had every right to take place.
“I don’t think our five days disturbed anyone,” Fleury said. “Cooler heads prevailed and nobody bothered us.”
In Pembroke, Ont., a different Kichesiprini group, the Kichesiprini Algonquin First Nation, is actively seeking federal recognition as an Indigenous nation.
Fleury said that a lot of groups identify as Kichesipirini, and that he thinks his own group’s claim to status is just as legitimate as the claims of others.
“I can tell you that when [Samuel de] Champlain came, he identified two spots,” Fleury said. “He identified Allumettes Island, and that was in 1613, and he identified the Coulonge River as the Kichesiprini.”
Polson said in her statement that the “Anishinabe community of which [Fleury] claims to be the leader does not exist.”
Fleury protested the name of the MRC Pontiac outside of its building in Campbell’s Bay on Oct. 21, alongside Quebec Green Party leader Alex Tyrell. Fleury had cited the name as disrespectful toward the legacy of Pontiac, a famous Indigenous chief.
Tyrell landed in hot water when the national executive of the Green Party of Quebec released a statement denouncing his association with Fleury on Dec. 8. The statement said that he had been negligent as a leader and lent his name to Fleury’s cause without consulting the party, simply to further his own political clout. A vote of confidence was held within the party from Dec. 5-13 and he received over 64 per cent of 752 votes to remain as party leader.
Tyrell released a statement on Dec. 8 that seemed to support Fleury’s cause relating to the “cultural hunt”, but did not mention his name.
“In the context of system racism, continued colonial oppression and unresolved land claims, it is unfortunate that many Indigenous communities living on-reserve feel that recognizing the rights of off-reserve Indigenous populations will limit their rights and access to their resources which are already scare and which are systematically ignored by the federal and provincial governments,” Tyrell said in the statement.
