Nunavut signs deal on retrieval of Inuit artifacts

SEAN McKIBBON
Nunatsiaq News

IQALUIT — The Nunavut government has signed a memorandum of understanding with NTI and the Inuit Heritage Trust to set up a historical advisory board that will work on the repatriation of historical Inuit artifacts.

“Our government is fully committed to implementing the land claims agreement,” said Premier Paul Okalik, adding that his government had already been looking at ways to repatriate archaeological and ethnographic items.

The new advisory board would be able to look at the issue in detail and advise the government, he said.

The territory has not committed a specific amount of money to pay for the board, Okalik said, but there is money budgeted for it within the department of Culture, Language, Elders, and Youth.

Only a day before, the agreement seemed to be on shaky ground when Nunavut’s deputy minister of culutre said she couldn’t sign the agreement without instructions from her minister Donald Havioyak.

But after some amendments to make the memo comply with the territory’s Historical Resources Act — inherited from the GNWT— all three parties were ready to sign Wednesday.

“We didn’t want to see any more duplication. The proposal as it stood did not reflect current statutes,” Okalik said.

The memorandum, as it now reads, says the board will address the:

establishment of museums;
commemoration of historic sites;
administration and maintenance of historic places and museums;
administration of the Nunavut Archives;
development of policies and procedure to address the repatriation of archeological specimens;
development of policies and procedures to address the recovery of skeletal remains and funerary objects;
development of policies to address the disposition of Inuit ethnographic objects and archival material.
“We needed a memo of understanding saying all parties had an interest in this field,” said Deborah Kigjugalik Webster, the president of the IHT.

She said that large collections of artifacts and ethnographic records taken from Nunavut exist in places such as the Prince of Wales Centre in Yellowknife, and the Museum of Civilization in Hull.

These large facilities have special climate-controlled environments and also the space to house these artifacts, and without similar facilities in Nunavut, the items can’t come home.

Webster said that when the three groups met in May and saw the collections at the Museum of Civilization it cemented their resolve to bring the items home.

“We need to establish a main facility, a repository or museum,” said Webster. “By signing this agreement the NTI, the Inuit Heritage Trust and the Nunavut Government agree to work together toward this end.