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March 1, 1985

The first attempt by the Nunavut and Western Constitutional Forums in 1985 led to political chaos at the legislative assembly in Yellowknife. It took six more years to set a political boundary between Nunavut and the Northwest Territories — a boundary that followed the boundary for the Nunavut land claims settlement area.

Boundary agreement in a shambles

ANNELIES POOL
Nunatsiaq News

YELLOWKNIFE — The process of dividing the NWT and building Nunavut has come to a halt with a complete communications breakdown between East and West.

Western MLAs rammed a motion through the Legislative Assembly yesterday approving the north-south boundary agreement reached last month, despite a withdrawal of support for the agreement by Eastern MLAs.

The move followed on the heels of an announcement by Iqaluit MLA Dennis Patterson that he is resigning as chair of the Nunavut Constitutional Forum (NCF).

Mr. Patterson said he had lost the support of the other NCF members for the boundary agreement of which he was a principal in negotiating.
NCF has reverted to its original position of a tree-line boundary which would give Nunavut the Beaufort Sea region, a proposal which has always been unacceptable to its counterpart, the Western Constitutional Forum (WCF).

In his statement, Patterson alleged the January agreement was the result of demands by the WCF and unfair to the people of the Eastern Arctic.

Patterson's resignation came just minutes before the Assembly was to debate a motion reaffirming support for the Constitutional Alliance and to discuss the boundary agreement itself.

Yellowknife Centre MLA Bob MacQuarrie, who is also a WCF member, denied WCF had made unfair demands on NCF.

At a press conference in Yellowknife this morning, Mr. Patterson made a long list of accusations against the WCF.

Nunukput MLA Nellie Cournoyea, a newly-appointed member of NCF who also attended this morning's press conference said the main objection to the boundary agreement was that the Inuvialuit had been put in the western territory without their consent.

The agreement gives WCF authority to negotiate with the Inuvialuit on how they can best fit in to a western territory, but does not provide them with a choice of either joining east or west.

"The people are asked to make a decision that they be told the decision has been made already and if they're naughty, everything will fall apart," Ms. Cournoyea said this morning.

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