The Prince George
itizen
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12,1991
51 CENTS
(Plus GST)
^..un&cicfel
Low tonight: 5 High tomorrow: 18
Tax windfall justified
Apartheid death knell
Jays drop into tie
12
13
17
Intrigue around Mashat 32
Phone: 562-2441 Classified: 562-6666 Circulation: 562-3301
MANITOBA CREE WINS BITTER ELECTION
Native assembly gets new chief
by JOAN BRYDEN Southam News WINNIPEG — Ovide Mercredi was elected national chief of the country’s most powerful native organization early today after a bitter, day-long battle.
Aided by a concerted campaign to stop frontrunncr Phil Fontaine, Mercredi managed to move up from third place to win the leadership of the Assembly of First Nations on the fourth ballot.
“When the final ballot is cast and the final person is chosen, we will stand united and as friends,” Mercredi, a Manitoba Cree, declared to about 1,000 cheering delegates and observers.
Fontaine, a fellow Manitoban who had earlier accused his opponents of ganging up and mount-
ing a smear campaign against him, immediately offered Mercredi his “unqualified support.”
“We came here as friends. We’re going to leave here as friends,” Fontaine told the crowd.
However, an emotional Fontaine, head of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, then left the stage to comfort his supporters while Mercredi took the oath of office. The four other candidates, who had thrown their support to Mercredi, remained on stage.
The bitterness between the two camps was ironic, given that both Mercredi and Fontaine had worked together last year as advisers to native politician Elijah Harper when he blocked the Meech Lake constitutional accord in the Manitoba legislature.
FESTIVAL MAKES PROFIT
Co-operative weather meant Financial success for the fourth annual Canadian Northern Children’s Festival last month in Prince George.
“That really made a difference, particularly on the weekend,” artistic co-ordinator Jo-Ann Merkel said today. “Ticket sales were up, and our food sales were better than anticipated.
“Saturday and Sunday were so nice there was a considerable walk-on trade. Whether they went to a show or not, they would walk through the park and have a hot dog.”
The children’s festival society realized revenues of $324,000 and made expenditures of $303,000, Merkel said.
“We wiped out the $21,000 deficit we had last year, so we can start the fifth anniversary in good shape,” she observed. “We feel the festival was a financial and artistic success, so we’re pleased.”
Forest practices earn mild praise
by Canadian Press
VANCOUVER — British Columbia gets a passing grade for the way it manages its forests, but it must do better, say two Swedish experts after a two-week tour of the province.
“You’re just scratching the surface,” Stig Hagncr, a professor of forest sciences at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, said Tuesday.
“You are going the right way, but a lot still has to be done.”
Forestry consultant Hugo von Sydow said government and industry should keep up their efforts to tell the public about the importance of forestry.
“You have enormous resources and a great potential to sustain those resources,” he said.
Both men, who have visited British Columbia before, were invited here by the provincial Forests Ministry.
On this trip, they toured the Prince George, Kamloops and Vancouver forest regions, looking at harvesting practices, reforesta-
tion and second-growth forest treatments.
They will provide a written report on their observations to the government later in the summer.
“B.C. must increase the effort it puts into intensive forest management and do it efficiently and rationally,” Hagner said in an interview.
Both men said Sweden has a considerably longer history in forest management than British Columbia and although there are similarities in the two regions, there are differences in some practices and attitudes.
“Clear-cut logging is no longer a very controversial issue in Sweden,” said von Sydow. “We went through a bad time 20 or 30 years ago, but people now appreciate that we have to clear the forest in order to rejuvenate it properly.”
Swedish law now requires clear-cutting in almost all logging activity. It is the most commonly used technique in British Columbia but is highly controversial.
School bid approved
A new Regional Correspondence School should open in Prince George by November, says School District 57 assistant superintendent Art Erasmus.
Trustees approved a bid of $234,900 Tuesday from Trimfit Construction of Prince George to build the 4,000-square-foot school on the Carney Hill Elementary School grounds.
The bid was the lowest of seven received. Four of the bids were from Prince George companies.
Additional costs include a design upgrade worth $35,000 and grounds development of $70,000. Site services fees, moving costs and furniture and equipment costs have yet to be determined.
INDEX
Ann Landers	.... 14
Bridge..................29
Business........22,23
City, B.C......2,3,21
Classified ....	26-30
Comic...................20
Commentary...............5
Crossword...............27
Editorial................4
Entertainment	... 20
Family..................14
Horoscope...............29
International	.... 13
Movies..................20
National................12
Sports..........17-19
Television..............28
HERMAN
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'Found New Zealand yet, Benson?"
Fontaine enjoyed a commanding lead on the first and second ballots while Mercredi, the assembly’s Manitoba regional chief, ran a distant third and second respectively.
But three of the four other candidates threw Mercredi their support on the third ballot in a bid to stop Fontaine, whose slick campaign and Liberal connections had antagonized many of the assembly’s 477 chiefs.
On the third ballot, Mercredi came up with 243 votes — a slim majority but still 30 votes shy of the 60-per-cent support required by the assembly’s charter. Fontaine captured 211 votes, or 47 per cent.
Although Fontaine himself wanted to concede and some chiefs urged him to do so in the interests of aboriginal unity, his
supporters urged him to continue the fight. Fontaine decided to stay in the race.
“In the end, what we had was a gang-up and that was unacceptable lo my people,” Fontaine told reporters as delegates prepared for the fourth ballot.
“Quite obviously, what we ended up with was (an) anti-Phil Fontaine (campaign),” he said.
Fontaine’s decision to stay in the race cost him support. On the final ballot, he captured 177 votes to Mercrcdi’s 271 — a 60.5 per cent majority.
British Columbia chief Bill Wilson, who dropped out of race to back Mercredi, denied there was an anybody-but-Fontaine movement
“Nobody ganged up on him. It
came down to two candidates and the majority thought Ovide was the best.”
Neil Sterritt, Gitksan hereditary chief from British Columbia, and Bill Montour, Mohawk chief of the Grand River Reserve near Brantford, Ont., also threw their support to Mercredi.
Mike Mitchell, Mohawk chief of the Akwesasne reserve near Cornwall, Ont., did not publicly back anyone else, but most of his supporters moved to Mercredi.
Wilson told reporters bluntly that he doesn’t like Mercredi but, nevertheless, could not support Fontaine. Wilson suggested Fontaine was indulging in “white man’s politics” with posters, buttons and hospitality suites.
Many of the chiefs at the as-
sembly’s 12th annual meeting were critical of Fontaine’s slick campaign and complained that a number of his campaign organizers, including his campaign manager, arc members of the federal Liberals’ aboriginal commission.
But, as he handed over the reins to Mercredi, outgoing national chief Georges Erasmus urged his fellow chiefs to put the bitterness of the leadership contest behind them.
“We have learned it’s never in the interests of first nations when we let things come between us,” he said.
The assembly represents 633 bands and about 500,00 status Indians across the country.
JULY ROADSHOW WEEKEND
Huge turnout expected at park
by ARNOLD OLSON Citizen Staff
If the Kelowna experience is any guide, Fort George Park could have 10,000 people attending the July 6 and 7 Music 91 Roadshow Weekend when John Denver will be the headliner.
That’s how many are estimated to have shown up in Kelowna last week.
Along with Denver, who has eight platinum and 15 gold albums to his credit, a long list of other performers will be featured here, according to the latest Music ’91 list. These include Paul Hyde, Norm Foote, James J. Robinson, The Nervous Fellas, Kin-latat, Fifth Avenue, and Tony White and the Heavyweights.
Local ticket sales for the Denver
concert have been good, Sonya Norris, Music 91 marketing coordinator, said here Tuesday. Even though the main advertising hasn’t started yet, more than 1,000 tickets have already been sold, she said.
Ticket prices are $25.25 for adults and $20 for youth or senior. Children younger than 12 get in free, but numbers are limited to two per adult.
“There are lots of things to do, all day long,” Norris said, several times stressing the event is a family affair.
“It’s more than just going to a concert.”
Because of its family orientation, none of the roadshow events throughout the province has a beer garden.
Two roadshow events have already been staged — Victoria and Kelowna — and the major problems of initiating this unique event have already been overcome, she said.
Music ‘91 will mean short-term employment for some people in each community it visits. As well as the organization’s fleet of 50 trucks and crew of 52 people, up to 100 people might be hired to help.
Prince George is the fourth community of 12 to be visited.
The family-oriented shows open at 11:30 a.m. each day and continue to 6:30 p.m. with the evening MainStage shows opening at 8 p.m.
Norris said many reasons exist
for the high proportion of U.S. entertainers. Many Canadian performers asked were not available for tour, she said. That U.S. performers are now less expensive because the GST doesn’t apply to them was not a major factor.
Not all the entertainment is professional. Music ‘91 advertised throughout B.C., inviting performers to enter their names. Many have been chosen to perform for their own communities or have been put on tour.
An example is that the local group, Shanagolden, is booked to perform July 6 in the period from noon to 5:30 p.m.
Two stages will be in operation, alternating so they don’t interfere with each other.
NDP eyes woman-only nominations
OTTAWA (CP) — The NDP will add new teeth this fall to a long-standing policy calling for more women candidates in federal elections, the party president said Tuesday.
The aim is to have women standing in 50 per cent of the 295 seats for the House of Commons, Nancy Riche said.
“It’s going to bc as close to mandatory as you can make it in a democratic process,” Riche said.
An amendment to the party constitution adopted with little opposition at the party’s Halifax convention last weekend gives the
federal council the authority to set affirmative-action guides for candidate nominations. Party activists hope the council will adopt the new rules in October so they will be ready for the next federal election.
“It’s historic, it’s wonderful,” said Riche, who backed the measure. Riche is also the executive vice-president of the Canadian Labor Congress.
The rules would likely be applied to clusters of ridings, so that about half the candidates in a given area would be women.
Incumbents would be exempt, so that a man sitting as an MP
wouldn’t be turfed out to make way for a woman. But the rules may provide for the nomination of a woman in a scat vacated by an incumbent MP.
Riche said the New Democratic Party has had an affirmative-action policy for nominations for years.
“One has to assume that the principles we espouse are the ones we are prepared to live with and part of what we’ve talked about is that women play an equal role in society.”
The move generated scattered opposition at the convention but Riche and B.C. MP Joy Langan
said there was likely an undercurrent of male unease.
Riche said she’s confident the policy will encourage women to win nominations in what she described as a “self-fulfilling prophecy.”
But the party is not likely to consider rules that would allow nominations to be overturned, Riche said.
“It still is a democratic process; it still is a nomination.”
Five of the party’s 43 MPs are women, including leader Audrey McLaughlin.
Citizen photo by Brent Braaten
Mr. Dressup smiles for good reason because Vanier Hall was filled with his young fans Tuesday to Mr Dressuo	see the farewel1 appearances of Casey, left, and Finnegan the dog. Ernie Coombs has been Mr.
^	Dressup	for 25 years and will continue to be one of the top Canadian children’s entertainers on CBC
for a while yet, but with other characters. Casey and Finnegan might visit, however.
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