‘Divide and conquer’ attitude between NTI and GN is gone: Premier
Under new leadership, NTI seems more eager to collaborate with governments, says Premier P.J. Akeeagok
Premier P.J. Akeeagok, left, and Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. president Jeremy Tunraluk both indicate there’s a warming relationship between NTI and GN. (Photos by Jeff Pelletier/Cedric Gallant)
There has been a “great shift” in the relationship between the Nunavut government and Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. with a new president at the top of the Inuit rights-holding organization, says Premier P.J. Akeeagok.
“For far too long, the divide-and-conquer has been placed between Inuit organizations and different levels of governments. For not our benefit,” Akeeagok said in a recent speech.
He was responding to a question about the current relationship between NTI and the Nunavut government, asked by lawyer Adam Chamberlain at the Nunavut Mining Symposium on April 8.
Since Jeremy Tunraluk was elected president of NTI in December, the organization responsible for ensuring Inuit get the benefits outlined in the Nunavut Agreement, has been more eager to collaborate and “show our unity,” Akeeagok said.
Improving the relationship between NTI and public governments was one of Tunraluk’s election campaign goals and was included in NTI’s four-year strategy report released following the presidential election.
Premier P.J. Akeeagok gives opening remarks at the Nunavut Mining Symposium April 8 in Iqaluit before sitting for a Q&A with lawyer Adam Chamberlain. (File photo by Arty Sarkisian)
As part of the strategy, NTI vowed to build pathways to “meaningful collaboration” with federal and territorial governments.
“During my campaign, I kept indicating that we will be partnering to make sure that we’re combating the actual issues in Nunavut,” Tunraluk said in an interview after the strategy report was presented Feb. 14.
Tunraluk was not available for an interview for this story.
Over the years, NTI has initiated several lawsuits against the federal and territorial governments, including an ongoing legal battle with the Government of Nunavut over Inuit-language education.
In 2021, NTI and the regional Inuit organizations took the GN to court over changes to a property tax law. That lawsuit is also still before the courts.
According to its strategy report, NTI has initiated at least five legal actions against the territorial or federal governments since 2015.
In February, Tunraluk said he was not anticipating any new legal actions against the governments in the near future.
Several former Nunavut leaders also previously talked about the frosty relationship between NTI and the Nunavut government.
During the NTI leadership election campaign in December, retired Nunavut senator Dennis Patterson said the organization was becoming a “quasi-government” rival to the GN.
“In the last decade or so, NTI has become a challenger, a competitor for funds, and a litigator against the Nunavut government that their land claim gave birth to,” Patterson said, calling the strained relationship one of the most significant legacies of former NTI president Aluki Kotierk.
In his speech at the mining symposium on April 9 following Akeeagok’s opening statement, Patterson talked about the new unity between the two entities.
“I’ve always known that when the territorial government leader and the president of Nunavut’s Indigenous organization, Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., when they stand together in supporting an initiative it sends a very strong and convincing imperative to Ottawa,” Patterson said.
Old news finally made public.
Finally maybe the employees of the respective orgs can focus on work that actually serves Nunavummiut instead of fighting each other. Pull together: a novel concept. Good for the new NTI Pres and good riddance to the old one who had an axe to grind .
Informative read
Thanks 🙏🏻
John ISH Ishmael of Brampton ON
Author of 5 books at Amazon US and Founder of Food Secure Communities Raised Box Urban Organic Gardens
Mr. Patterson has no business telling Inuit how to live and make decisions. Why this paper gives him space is non-sense. Let Inuit rule their own homeland. When Inuit matter to the public government is when I will appreciate good work. Just being yes folk ain’t going to get it done.
You’re wrong, again. You’re comments are also petty and childish.
Old white man can say whatever he wants. He might even be right about a few things. He might even know a lot more about a few things than you. In fact, I am certain he does.
We live in an open and free society. This is how it works and part of what makes open societies successful.
For now, thankfully, your ethnic nationalist dystopia remains a mere nightmare on the horizon.
There is only confusion and chaos and people who like confusion tend to want to control if they cannot control they bad-mouth and stage attacks
Senator is entitled to his opinion but someone with a law degree would you assume Dennis would point out both sides of the debate?
The Government of Nunavut’s failure to implement the Education Act has led to litigation, with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. (NTI) fighting for Inuit students’ rights to receive education in Inuktut.
The core issue is the government’s failure to provide public education in Inuktut, which NTI claims breaches the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. NTI is pushing for systemic changes to ensure Inuit students can achieve greater educational attainment in a school system that fosters their language and culture ⁴.
The sentor was one of the land claim negotiator and you would think he would j
Have addressed both sides of the coin.
As I see it Dennis’ comments needn’t be qualified by a deep dive into the arguments, when the point is fundamentally about how disagreements and conflict are handled.
1. Dennis was not a land claims negotiator.
2. Dennis has consistently tried to prevent NTI from suing government. He also tried to get NTI to settle for ridiculously low amounts.
3. NTI has a legitimate case. GN has failed to protect and promote Inuit language and skills in education.
4. This is not Dennis’ fault. It is 100% the fault of successive Education Ministers and Deputies. Far far too much time has been spent revising the Education Act and far too little on curriculum, teaching, and honest evaluations for students and parents.
5. Dennis IS an old white man. He should be more sage. Nunatsiaq News needs to seek out some new sources. You guys quote Dennis far too often and allow him to publish self centred and occasionally dubious versions of history.
6. PJ is looking for someone, anyone, to blame for the utter underachievement of his mandate. This is classic blame shifting and should not be taken seriously.
7. The GN has a tendency to believe that anyone who fails to agree with their half baked ideas is obstructing destiny.
8.. The GN draws done 3 billion a year. NTI once upon a time received one billion over 10 years for the Nunavut Trust to serve the present and all future generations of Inuit. Why the GN expects NTI to fund any government function is beyond comprehension.
9 Project or program funds NTI does receive should be spent promptly and effectively to SUPPLEMENT FOR INUIT the functions of government which GN, in theory, delivers to all people in Nunavut.
10. NTIs recent decision to pay for maintenance at the Arviat elders home is a warm hearted tribute to elders and a cold hearted move by GN to pass off its core cost and function to any sucker they could find. It was a crying shame that the GN had permitted that Home to fall, year after year, into such disrepair. It is amazing that GN convinced NTI that GN needed outside help to maintain GN’s own buildings that the GN had been neglecting.
11. More honest dialogue and less smug blame shifting would serve Nunavut well.
What is the point of emphasizing Dennis’ ethnicity, and what does it mean to say” “he should be more sage”?
I don’t understand why people are so angry here. This is a rare, almost one of a kind, story where everybody, two parties of a “conflict” (GN and NTI) and an independent observer (Dennis Patterson), agree with each other.
Premier Akeeagok, speaking on behalf of the GN, says the relationship was bad, but it’s getting better. President Tunraluk, on behalf of NTI, made warming the relationship between NTI and GN a major points in his campaign, and it even made it’s way to their strategic priorities. And retired Sen. Patterson simply says, “great, this is going to do a lot of good.”
And I really hope it will!
Soon there PJ that you will be out like Trudeau. When Trudeau was doing his speech, you were always trying to be shown. Just like when they ask you for the suicide crisis in kimmirut, your responds was just ask minister of health rather helping and try to find answers too. That’s not how the leaders supposed to do. Leader supposed to lead the people with care and support them. Not leaving them unanswered.