ITK will not attend meeting with premiers, citing presence of ‘fraudulent collectives’
National Inuit organization declines invitation for 3-day meeting this week in Huntsville, Ont.
Inuit Tapariit Kanatami president Natan Obed will not attend a meeting between Canada’s premiers and Indigenous leaders, citing concerns about “fraudulent” organizations being part of the event. (File photo by Jeff Pelletier)
Inuit Tapariit Kanatami has declined an invitation to attend a meeting between national Indigenous leaders and premiers of Canada’s provinces and territories being held in Huntsville, Ont., this week, saying non-rights-holding groups will also be attending.
The three-day meeting starts July 21 and includes all 13 provincial and territorial premiers and “follows a pattern of the Council of the Federation to include organizations that represent fraudulent collectives that falsely claim to represent Inuit,” said an ITK news release issued Thursday.
“We continue to encourage Canada’s premiers to respect Inuit democratic governance, our constitutional rights and our right to self-determination.”
The news release does not specify any groups and ITK spokesperson Patricia D’Souza declined to elaborate.
Instead, she said: “Our position on fraudulent collectives is well-documented.”
ITK president Natan Obed was not available for an interview.
This is not the first time ITK, which is the national organization representing Inuit in Canada, has skipped a meeting of the Council of Federation, which is the name of the organization of the heads of Canada’s provincial and territorial governments.
In 2023, ITK president Natan Obed declined the invitation to the meeting in Winnipeg and along with Cassidy Caron, president of the Métis National Council, criticized the federation for allowing Congress of Aboriginal Peoples and Native Women’s Association of Canada to attend.
Those two organizations are once again on the list of invitees for this week’s meeting.
“ITK generally welcomes any opportunity to share Inuit priorities with territorial and provincial leaders, but any such meeting should be done with clear objectives and be respectful of Inuit governance,” Obed said at the time.
The National Chief of the the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples Brendan Moore called ITK decision “unfortunate,” in an email to Nunatsiaq News on Friday.
“We respect their decision and wish them well in their continued efforts,” said Moore.
Representatives Native Women’s Association of Canada declined to comment.
Over the years, ITK has opposed participation in public or government engagement events with groups it considers illegitimate.
In 2024, the Northern Lights Business and Cultural Showcase was cancelled because of ITK’s concerns about the involvement of the NunatuKavut Community Council, a collective representing approximately 6,000 people in northern Labrador who claim to be Inuit.
This is getting beyond petty and stupid.
Nunaktavut recognition doesn’t in any way diminish the rights and benefits of other Inuit groups. Period!
This is the same guy who dismisses the growing numbers of Inuit in the south as essentially wannabes even though he’s lived most of his life outside of the north.
I’m tiring of the mean spirited nonsense this whole kerfuffle is stirring up for no good end.
Natan needs to move on and ITK needs to refocus on making itself useful.
this group is claiming Inuit ancestry because they see dollars signs, I spoke with an Inuk from Labrador and he said those people are very prejudice towards Inuit and Innu and never claimed any ancestries until Nunatsiavut was created and land claim was signed.
This guy doesn’t want to “work together” with the rest of Canada that would only benfit both sides.
It will be a better meeting without him. Natan will not be missed.
Must be better free travel opportunities that opened up to him.
Jesus wept. Let’s have a hissy fit and exclude ourselves because we got invited to the same gig as those we want excluded. Have a nice life, y’all.
Stunning and brave. On the other hand, NTI will call anyone an inuk. Maybe they should just move to nunavut if they wanna be recognize?
If you want to be at the adult table, you must behave like an adult. Instead ITK is having a temper tantrum and will be pouting in the corner. Natan, take your diaper off, put your on your grown up pants, set aside your differences aside just like grown ups do. That is what is expected of leaders.
Same story since day 1 since, it became nothing will happened unless every member of the Nunavut politic meet
I used to be afraid of where our governance was heading. Now I’m terrified for my children.
Is this wokeism, won’t-attend-spat, simply boils down because Edmonton Elks are highly considering renaming their CFL team back to Eskimos? With full support to just do it across Canada, from sea to sea to sea?
Reading Nunatsiaq comments makes my day because I think ‘oh, okay, I’m not the crazy one here’
The Eskimos should have never changed their name. I have a lot of inuk friends who were very upset with the name change.
Name change was mostly from white people that wanted them to change the name its called “virtue signaling”
Snipped from CBC New, July 20, 2020
‘Natan Obed doesn’t feel that he, himself, made the Edmonton football team change its name.
But the national Inuit leader — whose 2015 op-ed in The Globe and Mail brought the discussion into the national spotlight ahead of the team’s Grey Cup victory — says if the reports are to be believed, Inuit can now move on to tackling other issues without this “distraction.” ‘
So wll he complain then about not being heard.
Of course, and Nunatsiaq will be there to embellish the bleed.
Sigh..Just desolve Nunavut. Nothing but keeping Nunavummiut down and out.
Agreed 100% self government means business !
All the doors are open, but stupidity and people with no aspirations or any ambitions to improve mean that nothing gets done. So tired of the many Inuit who cannot see the forest for the trees if nothing is done for them as they want someone else to do the work…but this is a result that our colonial masters wanted.
APATHETIC INUIT.
The doors are opened, but if you cannot walk through them then perhaps yes, it is time to close that door perhaps. Nothing but negativity from people with no imagination.
His eyes are disgustingly displayed, whether by deliberately on media, i dont know but it tells his story and it’s disgusting too. He needs to move on.
Is he a shape shifter? Do u think maybe he is a lizard person?
This cannot be a conversation because it takes at least two entities to communicate. If you withdraw yourself then you leave the other (one) alone. This is exclusion and i thought that we got past that. “Our land” means just that!
Nathan Obed, he does have an issue with orgs, with their validity. Personality aside it is a valid issue. Bring on the clowns!
Only Inuit can say who is Inuit. This is a very well established principle, at least in the Nunavut Agreement. Nobody else, including the Federal government, can pick and choose who is Inuit, or who is called upon to represent Inuit.
I could only hope that ITK and its member organizations -all legitimate Inuit organizations- would do just as good a job policing other organizations besides NunatuKavut, because there is plenty of this going around.
It is becoming regrettably common for Environmental Non-Government Organizations that involve some Inuit to state that they are, in fact, aboriginal organizations when they are clearly not.
Often, these groups receive research and other proposal driven financial support from government agencies that are pre-disposed to their inclinations.
Not only do these groups mis-represent themselves, this has the added result that less funding is available for legitimate Inuit organizations to do the similar work.
Environmental groups are actively subverting Inuit governance and this has to stop, if only to reduce the divisions and acrimony between Inuit in deciding things for ourselves without a bunch of non-Inuit telling us what to decide.
Well said!
Obed you cotinue to embarrass the Inuit of Nunavut by this sort of decision. Everyone one sees your true motivation after your support of the retired pm of the ndp_liberals. It will be your political demise.
Even the true Iniit are questioning your decisons
Canada embarrasses itself with a standing round of applause for a veteran in the visitors gallery, a veteran of the 2nd World War who fought in concert with Nazies. Natan was seated at his side. The images are seared into the public memory. Former minister Trudeau apologized. Standing in with the war mongers on the wrong side of history is our ongoing legacy.
Almost their Inuit. Speak up for your rights too and tell them what is Inuit beneficiaries for like Cree and dene use Indian status. Good for you Mr obed, for speaking up up on fraudulent. So many Inuit are being rejected by their power on their work. And their work can be investigated.