"We were trying to start our land claims process, to finalize our treaty. Our elders told us that in the treaty we signed in 1921, we never gave up our land, the power and the authority over our land.
During the Berger Inquiry the elders came to the hearing and testified in a quasi-judicial forum, telling the judge how they remembered things: Philip and Mary Margaret Moses, Julian Yendo.
I came back from school in 1972. The highway was being built and Simpson was the hub. Along with that was the proposed Mackenzie Valley pipeline. A lot of speculators had movedin, getting themselves ready to take advantage of the construction of the pipeline.
The First Nations were by-passed, we were on the sidelines. We were not consulted about the development and we were not even considered to take on any jobs. There was a lot of racism. The animosity, we faced it every day. So the Inquiry had to have two hearings in Simpson, one for the Dene and one for the outsiders.
I was pretty young, only 25 years old, but the elderes asked me to be chief because of my education and because I understood our language and our culture.
Our position here in Fort Simpson was: this is our land, we've never given it up. We need to settle with the federal government before any development can happen.
These were my words to Judge Berger: 'It doesn't matter if there are 1,500 people in this town. The people I think I speak for are the Dene, the permanent residents of this town, not someone who is just looking to make a fast buck and then go home.'
The word 'self-determination' means we want to determine for ourselves how we will live in Canadian society.
We are still working toward that. Our work is not done yet. But we're in a far better position today than we were in 1974."
