First Nations Governance Act: Whose business is it, how we run our own government?

ID:	HARP-342
Title:	First Nations Governance Act: Whose business is it, how we run our own government?
Source:	Law Now , v.27(1) Ag/S’02
Parties:
Dispute Resolution Organ:
Year:	2002
Pages:	0
Author(s):
Keywords:	Canada, governance, government, human rights, law, civil and political rights, indigenous people, First Nations, minority rights, self-determination
Abstract:	In an earlier column I had mentioned aboriginal self-government and cynically asked, “What the heck did you think they were doing before we arrived, anyway?” Pre first contact, Canada was full of native groups, all with their own rules of membership, leadership and governance procedures and for the most part, our dealings with native groups, including treaties never said anything about wiping out these traditions. The law is pretty clear that existing rights of anybody, including the aboriginal rights of native citizens, can’t be taken away by a government unless the law is very specific, and although First Nations’ self-government rights have been ignored, for the most part they were never specifically stripped away.
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