Chief Franςois Paulette
Selá teané (all my relations)
What you do with your money, is your business. But when you begin to spend your money in my
territory, that disrupts and destroys our way of life, our civilization, then that becomes my business.
I’m not here to change your mind. But I’m here to touch your inner spirit. Your mind is connected very
much with your money. Your spirit has been disconnected with your relationship with the land, the
spiritual relationship with the land.
You are putting money into what we would call ‘into bad medicine’. Because that bad medicine is
destroying the water, the air, the plants, the medicines; all of the things that have made us who we are.
The Dené I come from, a tribal area north of where the tar sands are. There are 32 First Nations, there
are over 30.000 of us that live in the corridors of the Athabasca, the Slave, The Mackenzie Valley. We
refer to the land. We say the land is sacred. The land is holy. And we must treat her like that.
Wood Buffalo National Park is where I come from. I come from this beautiful, vast area. Wood Buffalo
National Park holds the last three remaining herds of buffalo in North America. It also is the home of the
whooping crane. That’s why I sue the tar sands. It is also the home of the pelicans that in numbers come
to flock in our rapids.
This development that you are engaged in, our people are suffering. Over twenty years ago I would
travel the river. I wouldn’t have to bring fresh drinking water while I’m hundred and fifty miles from the
tar sands. But today when I travel the river up to Fort Chipewyan I have to bring with me fresh drinking
water. There is something wrong with that picture.
Here the day, on Monday, I met a lot of beautiful people from Norway on your national day in Oslo.
From children to the elders, you have a rich history. You were proud to put on your regalia, your
traditional outfits. In our same way our country, our civilization is rich.
Schindler’s report this recently is quite alarming. That there are high concentrations of hard chemicals in
the water. Mercury, arsenic. The people in Fort Chipewyan are put in modus not to eat the fish. Not to
eat the moose. Not to take the medicines. But we are engaged with the governments that there’s not
respect, human rights. That we are not signatories to the UN declaration, United Nation Declaration on
the rights of the indigenous people. But Norway was a signatory to that declaration.
My investors… My investors; the water, the air, the medicines, the plants, the fourleggeds, the buffalo,
the birds, the fish have invested in our civilization for as long as we could remember; for thousands and
thousands of years, that has sustained our way of life. But today our investors are crying out for help.
Mother Earth, as we call her, needs our help. Needs your help. And I intend to carry this message to you
people, because fundamentally, fundamentally I think your nation, as been said here, is rich in
protecting the environment. You have a background that is much deeper than perhaps the Canadian
government, the Alberta government. And you need to practice that ethical reality that you carry out in
your homeland. I want to disclose this with The United Nation’s declaration on the rights of indigenous
people. Article 29: “1. Indigenous peoples have the right to the conservation and protection of the
environment and the productive capacity of their lands or territories and resources. States shall
establish and implement assistance programmes for indigenous peoples for such conservation and
protection, without discrimination.
2. States shall take effective measures to ensure that no storage or disposal of hazardous materials shall
take place in the lands or territories of indigenous peoples without their free, prior and informed
consent.
3. States shall also take effective measures to ensure, as needed, that programmes for monitoring,
maintaining and restoring the health of indigenous peoples, as developed and implemented by the
peoples affected by such materials, are duly implemented.
You are signatories to this declaration. You need to tell the prime minister of Canada that he needs to
sign off on this and start to practice what you are practicing here in your homeland. I finally just want to
say, the word I said “Selá teané” in my language means “all my relations”. That means not just the
human beings, but it means the air, the trees, plants, medicines, water, rocks. Because that is all life
forms and we need to protect Her. Mushie Cho (thank you). Thanks for allowing me to speak here.