Nathan Cullen Gets the Bums Rush

 


NDP MLA Nathan Cullen has been given his marching orders by the Gitxsan and Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs.


Members of the Gitxsan Huwilp Government posted the notice of eviction outside the NDP MLA’s office in Hazelton and said they were evicting him under Gitxsan law, Section 35 of the Canadian constitution and the 1997 Delgamuukw decision of the Supreme Court of Canada. The Stikine MLA’s Hazelton office is one of the two constituency offices he has in the northwest with the other situated in Smithers.

Cullen’s eviction comes a week after 29 Coastal GasLink (CGL) pipeline opponents were arrested by the RCMP near Houston between Nov. 18-19. All those arrested were subsequently released with conditions in court last week.

“You failed to ensure the safety of your constituents, including Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en people from the violence and excessive force used by overly armed RCMP at or near Houston B.C. and New Hazelton B.C. during the months of October to November 2021,” read the statement of eviction issued Nov 26.

Cullen, who is also B.C.’s Minister of State for Lands and Natural Resource Operations, was also accused of failing to properly represent the causes and concerns of the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en people in the legislative assembly.

Failure to leave would lead to Cullen being considered a “trespasser, without permission” on Gitxsan land, said the office of the hereditary chiefs in the statement.

Chiefs of the Gitxsan Huwilp Government claimed that Cullen had not fulfilled any of the promises he made to the Huwilp “directly” during his campaign.

Cullen figures this will all blow over - kiss and make up.

“I’m sure we can come to some kind of understanding so that we’re not denying people services that they need, because that doesn’t really help anybody from my perspective,” said Cullen.

That sounds like an incredibly boneheaded thing for a guy to say who has just been evicted.

Comments

  1. TrailblazerNovember 28, 2021 at 7:11 PM

    It would be a different world where the electorate could say to their representative; your fired!
    That said we all know that 'democracy' is not what it is cracked up to be.
    I am sure Mr Cullen took on his job with the best of intentions only to be shut out from any meaningful decision making by the inner cabinet.
    I had hopes for our now out of work MP Paul Manly who found himself way out of his depth in federal politics.
    Such is the fate of most politicians.

    TB

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Disaffected LibNovember 29, 2021 at 7:33 AM

      It's becoming a harsher, more miserly country, TB, echoing a global decline in democratic governance. Some part of it was the contest, largely American-driven, to competitively lower taxes. How many times were Canadians told it had to be done for us to remain competitive, "in the game"?

      We've created a situation where governments are reduced to sweeping up the crumbs in the cupboard. Scavengers. There are some very powerful people who wouldn't have it any other way. They tend to be the same people who, despite low taxes on the rich, still squirrel their money away in havens where governments can't (or won't) find it.

      At the same time, what remains of our once proud democracy, is hideously disfigured by the crisis of the day, the pandemic, and what will probably become the defining crisis of the next century or two, climate breakdown. Those, but especially the latter, are wartime-grade emergencies even if we haven't yet quite grasped that reality.

      Wait until we add to the floods and droughts and fires, food insecurity and mass migration. Canada in 10 years may bear a faint resemblance to how we're democratically constituted today.

      This could get ugly.

      Delete

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