[Witness speaks in Algonquin.]
Good day, everybody. My name is Aurel Dubé. I am an Algonquin from the Kitigan Zibi community. First, I need to say that I am glad to see people who I shared an event with last year when I had the honour to be part of the 100th anniversary of Vimy in France. I can recognize some faces, and I'm really happy to meet these people again.
I served 22 years in the artillery in the Canadian army. I joined back in 1983, and I released after 22 years, in 2005. The reason I was released from the military is that, during a mission, I had an accident, and I couldn't do my job anymore. I was released for medical reasons after 22 years.
During my career, I was posted to many places. I was in Gagetown, Shawinigan, Val Cartier, and Shilo. I also had the opportunity to do some UN missions or NATO missions. I served my first UN tour back in 1987 when I served with United Peacekeeping in Cypress. I was there for a couple of months. After that, in 1995, I also had the privilege to serve with another UN mission. That was in Haiti when René Préval was elected as the president of Haiti. I was there for six or seven months. After that, my last mission, when I had my accident, was back in 1999 to 2000 when I served in Bosnia.
During my military career, I lived through many things. Some of those things were hard for me to go through, like when I was in Haiti. I was on a call once where we had to find an airplane that had crashed. We had to give first aid and find the black box of the aircraft that crashed.
When I lived through those things, I didn't know, but that was the beginning of my PTSD. In 2010, there was that big earthquake in Haiti, 15 years after I was there. I started to be affected by what I had lived through back in 1995. With the support of Veterans Affairs and my family, I sought and got help with Veteran Affairs and with mental health aid in Ottawa.
All this is to say that I've been out now since 2005, 13 years. I am still connected with the army because I worked as a civilian employee for 11 years after I released. Now I am working with Library and Archives Canada. My job basically is an analyst. I work for people who served in the military and want to seek help from Veteran Affairs. We all know that they need to prove that they were in the military, so I respond to their requests to provide them their file, because they want to go with Veterans Affairs.
Ever since I was released, I've reconnected with my own community in Kitigan Zibi. It is only after that you realize that many more people served our country, like people from my own community who served in the military. They went to the First World War as well as the Second World War.
It's really important when we suffer from any sickness. The first thing really is to realize and to admit that you are suffering from something, and after that, you need to know where to go to get help. For many people, it might be hard for them to find their way to get some help. In my main job today at Library and Archives Canada, I try to help these people and refer them to what to do after I provide them with their record.
Basically, when I first got the invitation to come here, I was supposed to represent Aboriginal Veterans Autochtones, but you have just met our president, Mr. Thibeau, so I was asked to talk about my own history or to tell my own story.
During my military career, in 1990, as we all know, we had the Oka crisis. I was at the Oka crisis for many months. Back then, I had a fight with my own family; they didn't want me to go to Oka. It was, however, my job to go and work for the military. It took a little while before I was forgiven for having been part of the Oka crisis.
As a matter of fact, I'm just coming back from DND now, because this week is Aboriginal Awareness Week. I'm just coming from NDHQ, but two years ago, I was also there and I met a great native girl, Waneek Horn-Miller. She's a lady who went to the Olympics. If you remember, back in 1990 during the Oka crisis, she was well known because she had been stabbed with a bayonet while protecting her daughter. Two years ago, when I had the opportunity to meet her, I asked her to forgive me for being part of the Oka crisis. This is what I wanted to share.
I could also maybe say that before, aboriginal people were not allowed to join the military. Today, we are still affected by people who gave away their Indian status because they didn't want to have the same thing happen that happened to their brothers when they served during the Second World War. Because they were native, they did not have all the benefits that other people had when they came back.
I know some people still living today who gave away their Indian status. Because they gave it away, today their kids and their grandkids don't have their status, just because their father served during the war and gave away their rights to have Indian status.
That is what I wanted to share with you.