A_split_among_the_families

Feature Article April 29

Feature Article May 29, 2004

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A split among the families - the Ardoch Algonquin story Part 4

An event that took place in the late summer of 2002 has led to confusion and consternation among the Algonquin First Nations people within Frontenac County, and the fallout has left two groups laying claim to the name of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation. One group has Randy Cota and Bob Lovelace as co-chiefs, with Harold Perry as honorary chief; the other has Randy Malcolm as chief.

This split has implications for the Algonquin Land Claim, which is now on hold pending a determination by status and non-status Algonquins concerning criteria for inclusion of members for the purposes of the land claim itself.

The Ardoch Algonquin First Nation (AAFN), which was originally known as the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation and Allies (AAFNA), was formed about 15 years ago at a meeting in Harold Perrys house in Ardoch. Previously, Perry had been involved with a group called Manomin Keezis and with the Indian, Metis and Settlers Association (IMSET).

The Ardoch Algonquin First Nation was founded near the time the Algonquin Land Claims process was being set up.

The Golden Lake First Nation, now known as Pikwakanagan, had started a court case in 1985 that led the Federal and provincial governments to start land claim negotiations in 1992.

The Pikwakanagan First Nation is made up of status Indians under the Indian Act, but as with other large land claims across the country the provincial and Federal governments wanted to see non-status Algonquins included in the claim in order to find an agreement that would have as much legal validity as possible.

At the beginning of the process, the negotiating groups included Pikwaknagan, Ardoch, one or two other off-reserve First Nations and the two levels of government, but in the past 10 years several other First Nations have been established in non-status communities. One of them was set up in Sharbot Lake, and is now called the Sharbot Mishigama Algonquin Anishnabe First Nation (SMA).

AAFNA was run using a traditional form of governance. There is a council that is made up of family heads from each of the extended families within the group. In the first few years Harold Perry was the spokesperson, and different negotiators were appointed to attend meetings at Golden Lake, where the land claims process has been centered.

According to Bob Lovelace, who has been with the group since its inception, traditional governance means that all decisions are ultimately made by the Family Heads Council, and whoever was sent to the Land Claims table was to bring back information to the Council for decisions to be made.

This very point has been the source of much of the difficulties faced by the AAFNA (AAFN) in recent years.

In 1996, some families left the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation and formed the Sharbot Mishigama Algonquins, and SMA has built up its membership from that point forward. Its elected chief, Doreen Davis, is now the head of the Algonquin National Tribal Council (ANTC), which is made up of six non-status First Nations, including one called the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation under chief Randy Malcolm.

How this came to pass is a difficult story to piece together.

Algonquins who live within the claim territory may join any one of the First Nations. They simply fill in a standard form and check the box next to the First Nation they choose to represent them.

In the late 90s, Harold Perry decided he could not carry on as spokesperson of the Ardoch Algonquins. He had health issues, and was also becoming disillusioned with the land claims process.

Eventually, some of the family heads said it was important to elect a chief to represent the Ardoch Algonquins at the land claims process.

An election was held in 1998 and there were three candidates: Mitch Shewell, Randy Cota and Bob Crawford. Mitch Shewell pulled out of the race on the day of the election, and Bob Crawford was elected chief of the Ardoch Algonquins. Bob Crawford began attending land claims meetings, and Randy Malcolm was appointed by the Heads of Families as the alternate representative to those meetings. Randy Malcolm lives in Eganville, and originally came from Mattawatchen. He is related to Harold Perry, both of them tracing their roots to the Whiteduck family.

In September of 2000, Bob Crawford decided to take a lesser role, and Randy Malcolm became the lead negotiator, with Bob Crawford as his alternate.

When interviewed for this article, Randy Malcolm was reluctant to talk about some of the issues around what has happened to the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation, because the land claim process has entered a sensitive phase as eligibility requirements are being considered this month, but he did clarify several points. Randy Malcolm said that when Bob Crawford resigned in March of 2001, a Family Heads meeting named Malcolm himself as national negotiation chief, and Bob Lovelace as community chief of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation.

At about the same time, an election was called by the Algonquin National Negotiating Directorate (ANND) for each nation to elect a representative to the land claims talks. ANND hired an election officer to conduct the election throughout the six First Nations that made up ANND. Malcolm said that through this election he was acclaimed as chief of the Ardoch Algonquins.

This is disputed by Bob Lovelace. Lovelace concedes Malcolm was chosen to represent the Ardoch Algonquins to the Algonquin National Negotiating Directorate, which required that elected representatives be sent to it. So, at a meeting of family heads he was in a sense elected by a few people to attend meetings. He was not, however, elected by the membership. Randy Malcolm was never elected chief, and in representing us was expected to report back to the council for decision making, Lovelace said.

However, Randy Malcolm reiterated his claim that an election process did take place for Negotiation chief, involving all identified Algonquins within the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation, who were all notified, Malcolm said, and no one save himself sought the post.

In the fall of 2001, Pikwakanagan pulled out of the ANND, seeing its interests as the only status group within the land claim as contrary to those of ANND. Subsequently, the six remaining members of ANND began work on establishing a new body, which they named the Algonquin National Tribal Council (ANTC). Randy Malcolm told the News he had written permission from the Family Heads Council of the AAFN to participate in the development of the ANTC.

Bob Lovelace denies this. The Family Heads council became concerned about ANTC, and set up a four member committee, including Randy Malcolm, to develop a mandate for our participation. Randy Malcolm did not report to this committee, and this led us to dismiss him from his role as our negotiator.

According to Randy Malcolm, a document, signed by the Family Heads Council on February 16, 2002, named him as a spokesperson, and named Randy Cota as his alternate along with two other committee members, giving them direction to explore and begin into the development of a political body and a part of the said political body to represent the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation on an interim basis.

The split between the Malcolm and Cota/Lovelace factions took place on August 20, 2002. Malcolm was presiding over a meeting in Harrowsmith to discuss hunting agreements. Randy Cota, Bob Lovelace and Mitch Shewell arrived at the meeting and presented a letter to Randy Malcolm rescinding his mandate to speak for the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation and Allies. According to Randy Malcolm the letter was signed by nine people, seven of whom were Algonquins, including four family heads. The letter noted the obvious when it said that a division has developed within the Family Heads Council.

According to Randy Cota the letter presented to Malcolm was signed by nine family heads.

From that point forward there have been two groups claiming the name of Ardoch Algonquin First Nation.

Randy Malcolm is recognized as the chief of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation by the ANTC and has been negotiating at the Land Claims table as such. He says the bulk of Family Heads have remained with him, the only exceptions being Art Cota, Randy Cota and Mitchell Shewell.

Randy Cota and Bob Lovelace have been chosen as co-chiefs by the remaining Family Heads Council of Ardoch Algonquins, which they say includes all families that were involved before the split, except for three. This group is not represented at the Land Claims table.

Among the leadership of these groups there is considerable bad feeling. Bob Lovelace and Randy Cota deny that Randy Malcolm is now, or ever was, a chief of the Ardoch Algonquins, and Randy Malcolm says that Bob Lovelace is not an Algonquin and may have no aboriginal blood whatsoever. (Lovelace was adopted by Harold Perry in a traditional ceremony. He is originally from the United States and says he is descended from the Cherokee nation).

Both sides in the dispute have conducted re-registration procedures since the split took place. Randy Malcolm says that Bob Lovelace, Randy Cota and Harold Perry took about 40 to 50 members with them, and says the membership in the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation of which he is chief remains strong, with the majority of the Family Heads having remained in place.

He would not say exactly how many members there are in the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation, but did say there are close to 600.

Malcolm said he had to be careful about revealing numbers because they are matters for Algonquin peoples to consider, not the outside public, and that the information is available to the land claims process. This is the same stance taken by Chief Doreen Davis of the Sharbot Lake Algonquins and the ANTC in an interview with the News last month.

The Ardoch Algonquin First Nation under Randy Malcolm has received funding, through the ANTC, in order to facilitate its participation in the land claims process and has established an office in Sharbot Lake.

Co-chiefs Randy Cota and Bob Lovelace of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation claim that Randy Malcolm took about 50 members from three families with him when he left.

With the loss of three families, this left a membership of just under 500 in the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation under co-chiefs Cota and Lovelace, and Randy Cota said the membership is now in the range of 600. According to membership officer Carol Anne Bate, from the Crow Lake area, the list of members is a document that is available if Bob Lovelace or Randy Cota agree to release it. (Both Lovelace and Cota have agreed to release the list to the Frontenac News)

Carol Anne Bate also said it is not unusual in Algonquin history for an individual or a family to disagree with the direction of Council, and it is quite common for people to leave and form their own groups.

That is what happened when the Sharbot Lake First Nation was formed in 1996, and I, personally, have no problem with them following their own path. What is troubling in the Ardoch case is they are trying to keep the same name, she said.

The existence of two groups with the same name has been festering for 20 months, and is now coming to a head as the issue of eligibility requirements for the land claims process is being dealt with by Robert Potts, who was hired last September as the chief negotiator for the ANTC.

At a meeting in Pembroke a week last Sunday, chief Randy Cota challenged chief Randy Malcolm to produce his list of registered members, offering up his own for comparison, in order to see who really represented the Ardoch Algonquins. Chief Randy Malcolm did not take up the matter, and Robert Potts did not respond either. Randy Malcolm later said that he did not respond to Cota at the time because the meeting had not been called in order to discuss what Cota wanted to discuss.

Malcolm said that Randy Cota is trying to set a trap for him, and he is not going to fall into it. He said we have members on our list that have come on since the splinter group left, and I dont want to give Randy Cota the opportunity to try and influence those people.

Malcolm also said that the question of eligibility for the Land Claims must be dealt with first. After that time, elections will take place among all eligible Algonquins, who will have the opportunity to choose which group and which individual they want as their representative.

All eligible members will be able to run, and it will be a fair process, Malcolm said.

The next scheduled meeting about eligibility is slated for St. James Major Catholic Church Hall in Sharbot Lake on May 30. It promises to be a lively affair.