“We declare that this bill, should it pass, will never apply … and that our people will not accept its application over them anywhere within their ancestral lands,” the Longhouse said in a statement issued Monday morning. “Bill 96 contravenes the United Nations Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the recommendations made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.”
The Longhouse statement also warns that “if the government of Quebec places any value in developing a relationship … based on peaceful co-existence and mutual respect, this law will certainly deteriorate any amity that exists between our two peoples and destroy any hope of reconciliation.”
The Longhouse statement comes less than two weeks after several leaders of First Nations within Quebec — including Kahnawake Grand Chief Kahsennenhawe Sky-Deer — argued that the proposed legislation amounted to “cultural genocide.”
