Northern Lights too bright to fade away

We should all hope Northern Lights will continue to shine despite the recent disagreement among the two business organizations that ran the popular trade show for the past 16 years.

Last week, the Baffin Regional Chamber of Commerce and the Labrador North Chamber of Commerce announced the cancellation of the Northern Lights trade show and conference they had run for 16 years.

It had been a can’t-miss event on the calendar — a celebration of Inuit and northern business, politics, arts and culture.

The official statement pinned the cancellation on the changing nature of the “sociopolitical environment and relationships across the North” — whatever that means.

Nunatsiaq News reporter Jeff Pelletier got Baffin chamber president Chris West to make it clearer. Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the national voice for Inuit in Canada, objected to the involvement of the controversial NunatuKavut Community Council, an organization that claims to represent 6,000 Inuit in Labrador.

ITK rejects NunatuKavut’s assertion that its members are Inuit. Last year, ITK president Natan Obed lumped NunatuKavut in with the “tidal wave of false claims to Indigenous identity.” He accused NCC of engaging federal leaders, academic institutions and Canadians “in an attempt to advance its illegitimate claims to Inuit rights and status.”

For its part, NunatuKavut said it was “disgusted and appalled” by ITK’s attempts to deny its members of “critical federal supports.”

Is anyone surprised these two groups don’t want to be under the same roof for a weeklong trade show?

Rather than share the stage with NunatuKavut, ITK and the four other recognized Inuit treaty organizations threatened to pull out of Northern Lights.

Like in any divorce, the split is messy and has left everyone wondering how to pick up the pieces.

In February 2020, Northern Lights went ahead just before the world started shutting events down due to COVID-19. In 2022, Northern Lights was postponed. The event came back in Ottawa in 2023, and the 2025 edition was scheduled to be held in Montreal.

Last year’s event at Ottawa’s Shaw Centre put Inuit and northern business and arts centre stage literally with Parliament Hill as the backdrop.

Held in urban Canada — including the nation’s capital — Northern Lights was not only a celebration of Inuit business and cultural successes, it was an introduction for many non-Inuit.

Without the participation of powerhouse organizations like Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., and Makivvik Corp. and all their varied business interests, the glow of Northern Lights would have been dimmed considerably.

It also underlines the need to resolve ITK’s concerns about NunatuKavut’s assertion that it represents thousands of Inuit.

The federal government, for example, has recognized NunatuKavut and has given its community council financial support. But that’s a much bigger issue that’s going to take a long time to sort out.

In the here and now, let’s hope the Baffin Regional Chamber of Commerce (or some other white knight) will consider running a similar trade show and conference that celebrates Inuit businesses and culture from Nunavut, Nunavik, the Northwest Territories and Labrador’s Nunatsiavut area.

And the Labrador chamber could carry on with its own event (Labrador Lights?) if it wants to give NunatuKavut a place to shine.