Environment committee  It’s “Nee-tah”.

Environment committee  [Witness speaks in Dene] In my language, I just said thank you very much to all of my relations for giving me the time to present to you today. My name is Steven Nitah. I'm the lead negotiator for the Lutsel K’e Dene First Nation in our negotiations and discussions with both t

Environment committee  I can certainly try to answer some of those questions. If you look at Thaidene Nëné, it has a long history for sure. The interest of Canada in creating a national park in that area was first expressed back in the late 1960s or early 1970s, but at that point in time, just as with

Environment committee  The indigenous people of this country have rights identified in section 35. In 1982 that was an empty box. It's starting to fill up pretty well. It's been defined. To ask indigenous people to give up those rights for the sake of conservation may not be the best approach, in my op

Environment committee  I guarantee that you're not going to get any support from indigenous governments if you want to create conservation areas by excluding their ability to use that area. From the Thaidene Nëné perspective, it's built right into the agreement. In our discussions with Canada and the G

Environment committee  I hope to see more Canadians visiting Thaidene Nëné and making life-changing decisions while they're visiting our beautiful territory. I think there's room in this country for such an organization through which we could dialogue on best practices and move forward together. Just

Environment committee  I think we have to go back to the early days of contact in the relationship. It was recognized at that time that we needed to work together to survive, and I think we still have to do that going forward, nation to nation, in a relationship based on the treaties, whether it is the

Environment committee  Mahsi cho. [Witness speaks in Dene] I'm happy today to be here with you again. On behalf of Lutsel K'e Dene First Nation, I'd like to say how grateful we are for the opportunity to share the knowledge base that we've accumulated and the work that we've been doing in the last

Environment committee  Again, overlapping claims is a construct of colonization. Having said that, if the indigenous communities are not there yet, or not interested, then it's pretty hard to.... You can bring a horse to the trough, but you can't force it to drink. If they are under-capacitated but in

Environment committee  It's still a process. It's ongoing. Within the Akaitcho territory, which Thaidene lies within, there's a land claim that's going on between the Akaitcho Dene first nations and Canada and the Government of the Northwest Territories. There's an overlap in land claimants. NWT Métis

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  No, I'm not suggesting that only indigenous people will be allowed to protect lands in Canada henceforth. I understand that under the National Parks Act, Canada has pretty much reached its limit with Thaidene Nene and on all the national parks that are going to be created in Cana

Environment committee  Yes, I think that's proven to be successful in Australia. It would be creating indigenous protected areas where they want to create some capacity to manage those protected areas. I would suggest that those guardians programs don't have to be just for the IPAs. It could be for n

Environment committee  No.