DRUG DEALERS TO BE BANISHED

First Nations Community Takes Tough Stance To Fight Illegal Drug Use

The Pasqua First Nation leadership recently served notice that any
band members involved in illegal drug activity will be banished from
the reserve.

The chief and council passed a band council resolution in December
instituting a traditional method of sanctioning troublemakers within
the First Nations community -- banishment.

The passage of the resolution comes on the heels of Chief Elaine
Chicoose's warning in September that illegal drug activities on the
reserve would not be tolerated and those involved would be dealt with
harshly by the community.

Chicoose said severe penalties would be levied against anyone
involved in the sale, possession, cultivation, manufacture or
promotion of illegal drugs in that community.

The warning was in response to an Aug. 21 RCMP drug bust on the
Pasqua First Nation.

Drug enforcement officers who uncovered a marijuana grow-operation on
the reserve seized 7,592 marijuana plants with a street value of
about $7.5 million and charged six men, ranging in age from 18 to 57,
with a number of drug offences.

In September Chicoose said the band was looking at sanctions against
any resident band member charged and convicted of a drug offence
including loss of employment, termination of any benefits provided by
the band, eviction from band-owned housing, public posting of names
of offenders and, in severe cases, banishment from the Pasqua First Nation.

The Pasqua band council resolution has been received by Indian and
Northern Affairs Canada, but department spokesman Trevor Sutter said
the banishment resolution may not be enforceable.

"It is pretty complex," said Sutter. "It is different than a bylaw. A
BCR is generally an expression of the will of a band council, it is
not a permanent rule of government, unlike the smoking bylaws that
had to be considered (and approved) by the minister.

First Nations can pass BCR, but the question arises are they
enforceable. Enforceability is an issue."

If it was a bylaw, for instance, the Indian Act doesn't allow for
banishment as a penalty, he said. "But this wasn't a bylaw. This was
a BCR, and in terms of a bylaw only a court of competent jurisdiction
can consider its validity and either uphold or reject it," he said.

Pasqua First Nation is not the first band to try to use pressure from
the community to fight the growing problems of drugs and gang
activity on reserves.

In 2003, the Grand Rapids First Nation in Manitoba banished gang
members after passing a drug bylaw. The action is also now being
considered by the Samson Cree First Nation in Hobbema, Alta.