Webequie community divided over Ring of Fire

Inside Webequie’s band office, Chief Cornelius Wabasse tells reporters that his First Nation is open to development in the Ring of Fire.
Outside, a line of community members has a completely different view of the proposed developmewnt planned for an area less than 100 kms from Webequie.
The First Nation members outside the band office were angry that they were not being consulted on Webequie’s position on development. And they were adamant that the community will not stand for massive mines on their traditional lands.
“If those two mines open up we’ll be totally gone, wiped out,” said Norman Shewaybick. “I have grandkids now, and my life won’t mean much if my grandkids can’t live where I was raised.”
Harry Wabasse said community members are worried about the impact on the water, land and animals that the people of Webequie have survived on since “time immemorial.”
“The development is going to have a very big impact on the species that we live on,” Harry Wabasse said. “Our inherent rights are going to mean nothing at all.”
The two men took reporters to the lake surrounding the community, where they dipped cups directly into the water to show how clean the water is for drinking.
Later in the day, a community feast featuring walleye caught from the lake was held.
Clean water and fresh fish remain staples of the First Nation, where over 700 of the band’s estimated 860 members still live on reserve.
But the community has similar problems to those plaguing many remote First Nations, such as chronic unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse and desperate housing and infrastructure needs.
Those are the things Chief Wabasse hopes to change through the Ring of Fire development.
“We’d like development in our community, because we see an opportunity for our community to prosper,” Wabasse said. “We’d like to see jobs and training for our people to sustain our community.”
Yet the chief has his own frustrations over the way the Ring of Fire has occurred to date.
Webequie recently issued a press release expressing concerns over Noront Resources’ operating on Webequie’s traditional lands without an agreement to work with the First Nation. Wabasse said those concerns relate to “misunderstandings” between the First Nation and industry.
“Our community is open to development, but sometimes there are misunderstandings that have to be resolved,” he said. “We want government and industry to work with us, side by side, to understand us. We need to sit together and iron out the relationship to make it work.”
Wabasse acknowledged that Webequie is “very concerned” about the environmental effects of Cliffs’ proposal for an open-pit mine so close to his community.
But he said community members and Elders have always talked about how the First Nation has to work with government and industry to make sure everyone prospers from the development.
“We see this Ring of Fire development as an opportunity for the community to benefit for years to come,” Wabasse said. “If we don’t have development, how are we going to sustain our community and our people?”
Cliffs recently announced it plans to go ahead with the $3.3 billion chromite mine, a north-south transportation corridor and a processing plant in Sudbury.
For community members such as Shewaybick and Wabasse, Cliffs’ mine and other Ring of Fire developments like it are the biggest threats facing the community.
They argue that despite all the promises mining companies have made to Webequie over the past decade of exploration and pre-planning, very little benefit has actually come into the community.
“The mining companies promise so much, but so far we haven’t seen anything,” Shewaybick said.
“There’s a lot of clarification that needs to get back to the people here. And still the world sees us as the richest community in the North.”
“All of us were raised off from the islands, and this is going to totally destroy our home lands,” he added.