4 - Sunday, July 10, 1994 - North Shore News acism in fishing industry a scandal Collins ON THE OTHER HAND BY THE time you read this, the Feds will probably have given the Indians special fishing rights in B.C. for the third year in a ruw, thus proving that official racism in Canada is alive and weil. It is a scandalous situation that is handled with kid gloves by the mainstream media, who keep ace telling us how badly our Red brothers ure doing and what rotters the whites are, You don’t see much in the papers, for instance, about how the Indian “food” take amounts to over #0) pounds of fish for every man, woman and child on the Lower Fraser and that 85% of it is sold illegal- ly. But the true villains are not the Indians, some of whom are opposed to what's going on. The true villains are the politi- cians and bureaucrats who have sct up the Aboriginal Fisheries Strategy (AFS), under which there are three “natives only” fishing areas. Are such things necessary? Only if it is accepted that Indian fishermen have to be granted favors in order to get by. But they are as good at fishing as anyone else is. The above “food” figures come from the B.C. Fisheries Survival Coalition, which represents 4,600 commercial fishermen. Here are 66 The true villains are the politicians and bureaucrats who have set up the Aboriginal Fisheries Strategy (AFS), under which there are three ‘natives only’ fishing areas. 99 some niore, all bused on official statistics. Of the nearly $350 million paid to those who bring the calches in from the commercial fishery as a whole, the Indians get $122 mil- lion, or about 35%. They get 30% of the ordinary commercial salmon catch, plus another 3% from the “natives only” fishery. But it isn’t the Indian share as such that's priping the rest of the industry. It’s those racially segregated, “natives only,” tax-supported fish- eries that in three years have been given $41 million from the public purse; plus the fact that the Indians who fish in them enjoy the benefits of the rest of the fishery. And there are “natives only” fishing days on the Lower Fraser during which whites sit on the beach watching the Indians at work, Knowing that the next day those same Indians wil] be out on the common grounds, Such things breed violence. But the coalition is not mad at the Indians. It's mad at the politicians who have madc it possible. They are also upset that in those “natives only” fisheries the Indians police the catch and that the native enforcement officers are allowed to fish. That's an open invitation to corruption. For who is going to tell his friends and rel- atives that they have to stop fishing when the quotas have been reached? And being humun, how many won't cheat if they think they can get away with it? The fisheries manager for the Musqueain Fisheries Band, Joe Becker, pleaded guilty in June to landing 308 sockeye at an undesig- nated site. Yet he was given an absolute discharge. The same Becker was quoted a year ago as saying there were no unreported catches in the Musqueam fishery. “ET put my reputation on it because I managed it.” he said. For obvious reasons, Department of Fisheries and Oceans officers are not allowed to fish commercially or to have any financial interest in the fishery. But Ottawa seems to think that Indians have un unusual streak of purity. The usual double standards per- taining (o minorities are at work here. Coalition spokesman Phil Eidsvick made a neat point when he told me that although the feds were forced to withhold funding from that recent “Writing Thru Race” conference in Vancouver at which whites were shut out, they have not appiied the same rule in fishing. “How can the Liberals cancel funding for that because it discrimi- nates against whites, but still pour millions of dollars into a program that not only prohibits the participa- tion of whites, but also every other Canadian except natives?” he asked. He had a few thoughts, too, about the way the mainstream media deal with matters like this. The Becker story didn’t make the papers, for instance, even though the Coalition put out a press release on it. “And just imagine the fuss there would be if there was an Aboriginal Media Strategy corresponding to the Aboriginal Fishing Strategy, and that some days were native- only work days for media outlets, just as Friday, Saturday and Sunday tend to be native-only commercial fishery days on the Fraser during the sunmmer,” That would have the politically correct persons who cun the Ste waggling their feathers, all right. “Race,” concluded Eidsvick, “shouldn't be considered when a commercial fishery is opened.” True. But he forgets that official racism is good, and unofficial racism the work of the devil. 7 fi For a limited time only, save SO FABRIC VALANCES Choose from our entire Firishing Torch Collection. Over 8,000 combinations available. Choose from over one hundred colours. x % OFF 5O0bn 4 of plus save the G.5.T. on Contour Select mini blinds, VERTICAL BLINDS... 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