Tłı̨chǫ reflect on legacy of Treaty 11 during 100-year celebrations

As some communities in the Northwest Territories gather to celebrate 100 years since Treaty 11 was signed, many Indigenous people are reflecting on what the historic agreement means today.

The last of the numbered treaties between the Canadian government and Indigenous people, Treaty 11 travelled by river to nine signatory communities in 1921 and 1922. The document, which covers 950,000 square kilometres of what is now Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, affects several Dehcho, Tłı̨chǫ, Sahtú and Gwich'in communities.

Indigenous chiefs signed what they believed at the time was a treaty of peace and friendship on the understanding their rights to trap, hunt and fish on their traditional territory would be protected. The Canadian government, meanwhile, wanted to gain control of the land to pursue mineral and oil-and-gas exploration.

"The original treaty that was done in 1921 was for the best interest of the Dominion, so that they can have access to the natural and non-renewable resources for the greater society," said John B. Zoe, a senior adviser to the Tłı̨chǫ government who was chief negotiator when the Tłı̨chǫ Agreement was ratified in 2005.

It was the first combined comprehensive land claim and self-government agreement in the N.W.T.

Zoe said the Canadian government had already written Treaty 11 before heading north and Indigenous people were subsequently excluded from the growth of Canada.

Following several days of negotiations, Chief Monfwi signed Treaty 11 on behalf of the Tłı̨chǫ people on Aug. 22, 1921.

Today, the Tłı̨chǫ region includes the communities of Behchokǫ, Whatì, Gamètì and Wekweètì.

Whatì Chief Alfonz Nitsiza said Chief Monfwi was "very forceful" in ensuring Tłı̨chǫ rights to harvest would not be restricted and he outlined their traditional territory on a map.

"We always over the years maintained that this is our homeland, this is our rights to harvest," he said.

The Tłı̨chǫ government now owns 39,000 square kilometres of land between Great Slave Lake and Great Bear Lake, including surface and subsurface rights.

At the time of signing Treaty 11, Chief Monfwi declared that "as long as the sun rises, the river flows and the land does not move, we will not be restricted from our way of life."

Zoe said those words have been kept alive and helped to guide the modern Tłı̨chǫ self-government agreement.

"We now have the ability to strengthen our relationship to our own lands, to our language, our cultural way of life of doing land-based activities — things that we should have been doing for a long time," he said.