The Nanisivik penal colony?

By the time you read this, John Godfrey, the federal minister of state for infrastructure and communities, will have finished a tour of northern Canada that began this past Monday in Whitehorse.

Yesterday, Godfrey visited Pangnirtung and Iqaluit. While here Godfrey performed the usual routine tasks: meet the local supplicants, put on a convincing display of fake sincerity, then announced a sprinkling of federal guilt money that was already announced in 2003.

As for what Nunavut leaders told him, that’s equally predictable. They’ll have said what they’ve said for years: that Nunavut’s infrastructure, whether it be related to municipal works, the transportation system, or public housing, is in appalling shape. Then they’ll have asked him for money, as they should. Nunavut’s infrastructure deficit is well-documented, especially by the Conference Board of Canada and the Nunavut Association of Municipalities, and obvious to every person living in Nunavut today.

It’s ironic then, that in a week when the word “infrastructure” was on everyone’s lips, that the Government of Nunavut would announce a ministerial visit to Arctic Bay at the end of this month.

On Jan. 31, David Simailak, the minister of economic development, will “lead” a platoon of GN big shots, including Premier Paul Okalik and cabinet ministers Olayuk Akesuk and Peter Kilabuk, into Arctic Bay. Accompanied by some hired help from the GN bureaucracy, they’ll explain why many tens of millions of dollars worth of valuable infrastructure — an entire town site — will be bulldozed and tossed into a empty mine shaft.

That, essentially, is what is happening to what’s left of the former mining community known as Nanisivik, which for many years supplied Arctic Bay residents with jobs, a jet-capable airstrip, and other services.

Breakwater Resources Ltd., the current owner, began to shut down production at the Nanisivik mine in the fall of 2001, after announcing their intention to do so in the summer of that year.

That was three and half years ago. By November of 2001, the company was ready to seek approval from the Nunavut Water Board for its plan to close the mine and clean up the site. That plan called for the removal of all buildings and restoration of the site to its natural state.

But Colin Benner, Breakwater’s president, also said in November of 2001 that the company would adjust those plans should the Nunavut government choose to use some or all of the site for some other purpose. As late as July of 2004, company officials were still taking the same approach.

But by then it was too late. On July 6, 2004, the Nunavut Water Board gave Breakwater permission to start demolishing buildings, a job that will be done by the fall of this year. And the Government of Nunavut — almost a year ago — had already turned down offers from Breakwater to buy some or all of the infrastructure at Nanisivik.

Bill Heath, a Breakwater vice-president and the former mine manager at Nanisivik, had this to say, in an article published July 9, 2004 in Nunatsiaq News:

“We were of the view that there was still some life left in those buildings. We’ve been trying very, very hard for almost five years to find some alternative purpose for Nanisivik that would allow the infrastructure to stay in place.”

There’s no doubt about what the people of Arctic Bay wanted: an alternative use for the site. They made that clear right from the beginning. In November of 2002, Joanasie Akumalik, then the mayor of Arctic Bay, said the community was getting tired of waiting for answers.

“All the infrastructure is there, but I think somebody is afraid to make a decision,” Akumalik said in an article published Nov. 1, 2002, in Nunatsiaq News. You got that one right, Joanasie.

If the people of Arctic Bay were frustrated then, one wonders how they feel now. Perhaps the trades training centre they proposed was not practical. But the excuse given for the delays, possible contamination of buildings, is weak. No one ever raised that issue during all the years when people ate, bathed, slept and raised their children in them.

To be fair, GN’s approach to the people of Arctic Bay has been consistent: delay, delay, delay and when appropriate, fill the air with nonsense. With that in mind, we have our own alternative use proposal for Nanisivik: a penal colony for incompetent GN officials. JB