GN should support birthright corporations

I am writing to express my disappointment with the Government of Nunavut for how it has handled the fuel contracts in the Baffin and Kivalliq regions.

The decision is bad. It doesn’t matter who owns the company that lost — there will be increases in costs in all Nunavut regions. The buying patterns for the Kivalliq will change to Montreal. The government knew this and still it move in this direction.

The fact that the Northern Transportation Company Ltd. is 50 per cent owned by Inuit is embarrassing, because we should be trying hard to support our companies, not trying to destroy them.

The decision the government made affects NTCL and its many customers in a big way. The savings you make up front are a mere fraction of what it will cost in the long run in increased freight and handling costs.

It seems to me that the government and the media are often really hard on our birthright corporations. We should require a higher standard of our corporations and I don’t think there is a problem with them meeting those expectations but it seems that they are always being treated poorly in Nunavut.

The government has tried to do what the last government tried to do. Congratulations, you succeeded. The reason the old government didn’t succeed is that people were given an opportunity to provide feedback. The regions fought back and argued against what the then-government tried to do.

The argument was strong and still is but there is no opportunity to discuss this issue with the government. This leads me to wonder, whose agenda are we following? The old saying is if you smell a rat there probably is one close by. It may surprise the government and media that there really are people who support our birthright corporations. Maybe some time should be spent getting to know our point of view. We apparently already know yours.

I have gone from mad to very deeply concerned, as we all should be. I hope they don’t proceed with this direction. We do not need this.

Wilf Wilcox
Cambridge Bay