News & Events
First Nations people vote when it counts
September 22, 2008
It's election time in Canada, or if you live on the Sandy Bay First Nation, election time twice over with their elections for chief and councillors also being held in October. I have often read comments that Indian people don't vote. That assessment is untrue.
Many First Nations are the most democratic places in Canada, maybe the world. Most have elections every two years, voter participation is very high and the barriers to candidacy are very low. If you want to be a candidate all you have to do is put forward your name. You don't have the hassle of working through the political party system or have to spend a chunk of money on advertising.
Just look at Sandy Bay. There will be 14 candidates for chief and 28 for the four councillor positions. Given such a huge list of candidates, it is tough for people to not vote on the grounds that there isn't anyone worthy of supporting.
If anything, there is an excess of democracy. Having elections every two years puts some First Nations into an almost perpetual campaign mode, which undermines stability.
Voting rates are usually far lower in federal and provincial elections. The reason for the low turnout is that the mainstream political system neither includes nor represents Indian people. Outside of the far northern ridings - where Tina Keeper has been elected federally and Eric Robinson and Oscar Lathlin have won provincially - Indians rarely get the opportunity to become candidates for the major parties except in lost-cause ridings.
You know how it is: the established parties will select - or recruit - an Indian to run in a constituency where the party usually loses by a landslide anyway. This lets a party claim it is pro-native by arguing that it has native candidates.
The parties usually use the term Aboriginal, which includes Indians, Inuit and Metis. We are each distinctly different people, both legally and in the issues we face. The non-native public often does not understand this and that is why I am strongly opposed over use of the term Aboriginal.
I am not criticizing Indian candidates who run for Parliament or the Legislature in lost-cause ridings. It takes courage to be a candidate, and I if I was living in one of those ridings I would vote for an Indian candidate so long as his or her party's platform wasn't too offensive.
Sandy Bay is an excellent example of the situation facing First Nations. In the 2006 Band elections more than 1,200 votes were cast. In the federal election less than a third that number voted. An examination of the federal vote totals explains why turnout was so low at 404 ballots. Nearly 60% of voters in Dauphin-Swan River constituency supported the Conservative candidate while the New Democratic Party and Liberal candidates picked up about 18% each. Meanwhile, Sandy Bay totals were Liberals 197; NDP 84 Conservatives 13, Christian Heritage 6, Green Party 2.
With fewer than 3% of voters supporting the candidate, Inky Mark, who was elected by a landslide, it is easy to understand why so many potential voters thought "Why bother?"
I encourage Indian people to vote in the upcoming federal election, but the real issue of importance is electoral reform and the development of new strategies to influence governments.
Grand Chief Morris J. Swan Shannacappo of Southern Chiefs Organization