Nunavik debates new government on Facebook

Facebook’s group, called Nunavik and the Nunavik Regional Government’s Final Agreement, has attracted more than 800 Nunavimmiut since it was created in February.

If you’re a member of the Facebook group called Nunavik and the Nunavik Regional Government’s Final Agreement, chances are you’re drowning in discussions on the region’s upcoming referendum, scheduled for April 27.

The social networking site’s interactive group has attracted more than 800 Nunavimmiut since it was created in February, launching a lively discussion on the future of the region.

Since then, there has been a steady stream of commentary on the NRG’s final agreement, which details the amalgamation of the Kativik Regional Government, the Kativik School Board and the Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services into a single, new regional government structure.

Not everyone is convinced that the proposed governance model is the best way for Nunavik to move forward.

Based on commentary, the site appears to have attracted more naysayers than those who are prepared to vote “yes” on April 27.

Zebedee Nungak, a frequent contributor to the group, isn’t convinced the NRG will bring Nunavik closer to political autonomy.

He’s no stranger to the subject: as president of Makivik Corp. in 1997, Nungak re-ignited self-government talks with Lucien Bouchard, then the Quebec premier.

That moment was even captured on film and included in the NRG’s promotional film titled “Nunavik: Moving Forward.”

“As I co-star with Premier Bouchard in the video clip, I speak of ‘governing and governance’, not ‘amalgamation,’” Nungak says on Facebook.

“Somewhere in the timeline, the purpose of negotiations for [the] Nunavik Government got downgraded to a gigantic bureaucratic re-arrangement, and negotiations about future negotiations.”

Nunagak’s criticism of the proposed model stems from negotiations done in “unreasonably tight secrecy” — the agreement should have been based on a more public, grassroots debate, Nungak argues.

“Voting citizens were kept in the dark about progress and contents of negotiations,” he says. “Ordinary residents in communities were never shown documents, maps, charts or drafts of what was being produced.”

In another post, Mary Simon, president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami points out that the French version of the agreement calls the new model an “administration” rather than a government, which is no different from the Kativik Regional Government’s current French translation, which calls it “l’administration régional de Kativik.”

“Administration is completely different from government and as a voter I want to know how you interpret the two words,” Simon writes.

The Facebook group has led to much speculation about the broader impacts that the NRG could have on Nunavimmiut.

Some group members have expressed concern that their rights as James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement beneficiaries will be compromised under the new agreement.

That led one of the NRG’s negotiators, Harry Tulugak to accuse the Facebook group of “fear-mongering” and spreading incorrect information.

“I’ve read so much garbage on it,” Tulugak told an NRG information session held last month in Montreal.

But the Facebook group’s creator, Johnny Kasudluak, who has resigned from administering the group since announcing his candidacy for the Green Party in the federal election, says the online group has started a very important debate.

“I believe this group has had an interaction [we haven’t] seen since the 1970s,” Kasudluak said.

“I personally believe that it has reached out to the Nunavik public and beyond, far more successfully than all of the negotiating parties for the Nunavik Regional Government in a very short period of time.”

In recent weeks, the Facebook page has heard from more supporters of the NRG, eager to balance out the debate as the referendum date on April 27 draws near.

“We are here at this stage where Nunavik has never been before, where the people are being asked to make a choice that will better the lives of Nunavimmiut, rather than the process which took place 36 years ago where Nunavimmiut did not have a choice,” writes Mary Pilurtuut, the mayor of Kangiqsujuaq who also sits on the KRG’s executive committee.

“Look at Greenland, it took them 40+ years to gain an autonomous government. We learned to crawl, learned to walk, isn’t time to run?”

In a signal of support from the KRG, its chair, Maggie Emudluk, recently posted on the Facebook page, arguing that that the region’s three main organizations need to regroup in order to be a more efficient decision-making forum.

“To reject [the NRG] would constitute a giant step backward and shelf the Nunavik self-government project for many more years,” Emudluk said.

In the ongoing and sometimes heated debate, Nunavik residents can at least find perspective in the little more than two weeks they have until they mark their ballot in the NRG’s April 27 referendum.

As Facebook group member Billy Watt points out, “Remember, the voter(s) are the bosses.”