Nunavik’s youth association remains “frozen”

The message to the Kativik Regional Government council from Saputiit’s president Elizabeth Annahatak, shown here last May in Puvirnituq, remains the same: Nunavik’s youth organization has no money. (FILE PHOTO)

KUUJJUAQ — More than seven in 10 Nunavik residents are under the age of 35, but its Saputiit youth association is still struggling to get on its feet.

The organization still hasn’t received any money from Quebec for more than a year.

“The main office has not opened nor were we able to hire any new staff or hold any elections for the vacant executive positions due to our financial situation,” said Elizabeth Annahatak in her September report to the Kativik Regional Council meeting in Kuujjuaq.

Annahatak was elected president of Nunavik’s Saputiit youth association last November, beating Jonathan Epoo in an election whose results he contested.

Annahatak said “discrepancies” in the organization’s finances have left Saputiit unable to focus on more than straightening out the situation — the same state of affairs that she reported on last May at the KRG council meeting in Puvirnituq.

An independent auditor’s report of the fiscal year ending March 31, 2011 from Raymond Chabot Grant Thorton found that there were “major deficiencies in the internal countrol system. We were unable to satisfy ourselves to as to the nature and amounts of revenues and expenses of Saputiit Youth Association.”

“We are doing all that we can to get the organization going again,” said Annahatak, who nevertheless described Saputiit as “frozen.”