MNN. October 14, 2008. Canada says it “Didn’t see anything! Didn’t hear anything! And ain’t gonna say anything!” Kahentinetha and Katenies filed in the Federal Court a lawsuit against Canada on August 20, 2008. [Section 48 of the Federal Court Act Case #T-1309-08]. It was for the assault, arrest and illegal detention on June 14, 2008 of these two women by the Canada Border Service Agents CBSA at the Cornwall Ontario checkpoint. This runs through the middle of the community of Akwesasne on sovereign Kanion’ke:haka/Mohawk Territory.
Showing posts with label rebellion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rebellion. Show all posts
Friday
Oh, Canada...more from MNN...
CANADA’S “3 MONKEYS” DEFENCE OF BORDER ATTACK & THEIR DEMAND FOR $20,000 FROM THEIR TWO MOHAWK WOMEN VICTIMS
MNN. October 14, 2008. Canada says it “Didn’t see anything! Didn’t hear anything! And ain’t gonna say anything!” Kahentinetha and Katenies filed in the Federal Court a lawsuit against Canada on August 20, 2008. [Section 48 of the Federal Court Act Case #T-1309-08]. It was for the assault, arrest and illegal detention on June 14, 2008 of these two women by the Canada Border Service Agents CBSA at the Cornwall Ontario checkpoint. This runs through the middle of the community of Akwesasne on sovereign Kanion’ke:haka/Mohawk Territory.
Expand the post +/-
MNN. October 14, 2008. Canada says it “Didn’t see anything! Didn’t hear anything! And ain’t gonna say anything!” Kahentinetha and Katenies filed in the Federal Court a lawsuit against Canada on August 20, 2008. [Section 48 of the Federal Court Act Case #T-1309-08]. It was for the assault, arrest and illegal detention on June 14, 2008 of these two women by the Canada Border Service Agents CBSA at the Cornwall Ontario checkpoint. This runs through the middle of the community of Akwesasne on sovereign Kanion’ke:haka/Mohawk Territory.
Maybe it will be time (soon?) for us to review past times of rebellion and revolutionary disturbance...
Now you have touched the women
You have struck a rock
You have dislodged a boulder
You will be crushed!
Expand the post +/-
NOW YOU HAVE TOUCHED THE WOMEN (1)
African Women`s Resistance to the Pass Laws in South Africa 1950-1960
by Elizabeth S. Schmidt
Introduction
The decade of the 1950s was a decade of turmoil in South Africa. In the urban areas, a strong alliance was being forged between racially oppressed groups and sympathetic whites. As a united front against apartheid, the non-racial Congress Alliance, (2) formed from previously organised racially-based and worker groups, defied unjust laws and conducted campaigns against forced removals under the Group Areas Act and against inferior "Bantu" education for African children. The alliance organised bus boycotts, stay-at-homes, and rent strikes in the African townships. Perhaps the most significant Congress campaign of the decade was the campaign against the pass laws, and in particular, the extension of reference books to African women. No other campaign was carried out on such a massive scale or was sustained over as many years. No other campaign struck at the very root of the apartheid system.
Protest against the pass laws was not an innovation of the 1950s. The African National Congress (ANC) had been organising opposition to the legislation since its founding in 1912. The significance of the campaigns of the 1950s lay in the adoption of new strategies for bringing about fundamental change. For the first time, anti-pass protesters employed techniques of mass action, strikes, boycotts, and civil disobedience on a wide scale, abandoning the appeals, petitions and deputations that had characterised ANC protests for more than forty years. Efforts at gentle suasion and pleas for patient waiting were cast aside as remnants of a bygone era. The degree of popular involvement in the anti-pass actions and the level of spontaneous activity in the rural areas was unparallelled in any other period of South African history. Finally, in the 1950s, the primary catalysts of the anti-pass protests were not the traditional male leaders, but thousands of African women, many of whom had never before been involved in political protests or demonstrations.
In the urban areas, the women`s campaigns were primarily organised by the ANC Women`s League and the nonracial Federation of South African Women. In the rural areas, resistance was largely spontaneous. Although the Government charged that the unrest was due to the work of "outside agitators", the rural women were, for the most part, acting on their own initiative and according to their own understanding of how the extension of the pass laws could affect their lives. While women who worked in the urban areas brought home new tactics, insights and information when they returned to the reserves, they were contributing to a momentum that had gathered on its own.
The militancy of the women, their level of organisation in the urban areas, and the ease with which they discarded their expected subordinate role came as a shock to many of the men and even to some of the women. Although women were deeply involved in all of the Congress campaigns of the 1950s, the leadership of the Congress organisations was dominated almost exclusively by men. (3)
As the women`s campaigns gathered strength, the ANC National Executive Committee pointedly acknowledged the role of women in the liberation struggle. It was obvious, from the wording of its statements, that the importance of women to the struggle had not previously been assumed. In its report to the Annual Conference of December 17-18, 1955, the ANC National Executive Committee remarked that the ANC Women`s League, which was formed in part to "take up special problems and issues affecting women", was not "just an auxiliary to the African National Congress, and we know that we cannot win liberation or build a strong movement without the participation of the women..." (4)
African women played a leading role in the resistance to pass legislation because of the particular way in which influx control measures, implemented through the pass system, affected their position in society as well as African family life. On the basis of race, African women suffered the same disabilities as African men. Because of their sex, however, they carried a double burden. At the bottom of the social and economic hierarchy, African women were predominantly employed in low-paying, unskilled jobs. Because of the tenuous nature of their employment - largely in the domestic service and informal sectors - African women were particularly vulnerable to removal from the urban areas as "idle" Africans or "superfluous appendages". Legal constraints made it far more difficult for African women than men to acquire urban residency rights, accommodations in the urban areas, and land in the African reserves. Influx control laws, and by extension the pass system, were intentionally used by government officials to bar African women from the urban areas and to confine them to the African reserves.
Life in the reserves was an existence of poverty and hardship for the vast majority of the people. Enforced landlessness had transformed African men from self-reliant peasants to migrant labourers in the white areas. Influx control laws meant that their families were forced to stay in the reserves, where the men could visit them once a year. The burden of raising children under such conditions, which fell almost exclusively on the women, became increasingly arduous. As the soil lost its fertility and landlessness became more acute, the reserve economy deteriorated. The women`s role as cultivators and providers eroded, and with it, women`s social status. Rather than being major contributors to the families` livelihood, women became increasingly dependent upon male earnings. However, these earnings were neither large nor secure. In many cases, money from the "white" areas came sporadically or not at all.
During the period that women were free from pass law restrictions, some had been able to skirt the influx control regulations and join their husbands in the urban areas. Some found menial jobs which, although low-paying and insecure, were more lucrative than subsistence farming. These women knew that the extension of passes to women would increase the effectiveness of the influx control system. No longer would there be an exit from the reserves, a way for women to earn money to feed their children or to live with their husbands in the urban areas. As a result, when in 1952 the Government announced that African women would be forced to carry passes, the women responded with vehemence. Subjection to pass law controls would destroy their last remaining hope - their freedom of movement. Unlike African men, the women who resisted these laws had nothing further to lose. Protesters in the rural areas were not risking the loss of urban residency rights, houses or jobs. They could afford to be bold where men were apt to be hesitant. The women could only gain by their militancy.
Resistance to the pass laws was the overwhelming, but not the only issue of the 1950s. African women became involved in a number of campaigns focussing on issues that affected their ability to care for their children and to keep their family unit together. They protested the pass laws, "Bantu" education, rent hikes, bus fare increases, forced removals of African communities, government-owned beer halls that soaked up their husbands` wages and laws that prevented them from selling home brew, an important source of income for many women. In the rural areas, women resisted the Government`s "betterment" schemes, which included the mandatory culling of precious livestock, required women to fill and maintain cattle dipping tanks without pay, and enforced soil conservation measures which dispossessed many families of arable land.
the rest is here...
You have struck a rock
You have dislodged a boulder
You will be crushed!
NOW YOU HAVE TOUCHED THE WOMEN (1)
African Women`s Resistance to the Pass Laws in South Africa 1950-1960
by Elizabeth S. Schmidt
Introduction
The decade of the 1950s was a decade of turmoil in South Africa. In the urban areas, a strong alliance was being forged between racially oppressed groups and sympathetic whites. As a united front against apartheid, the non-racial Congress Alliance, (2) formed from previously organised racially-based and worker groups, defied unjust laws and conducted campaigns against forced removals under the Group Areas Act and against inferior "Bantu" education for African children. The alliance organised bus boycotts, stay-at-homes, and rent strikes in the African townships. Perhaps the most significant Congress campaign of the decade was the campaign against the pass laws, and in particular, the extension of reference books to African women. No other campaign was carried out on such a massive scale or was sustained over as many years. No other campaign struck at the very root of the apartheid system.
Protest against the pass laws was not an innovation of the 1950s. The African National Congress (ANC) had been organising opposition to the legislation since its founding in 1912. The significance of the campaigns of the 1950s lay in the adoption of new strategies for bringing about fundamental change. For the first time, anti-pass protesters employed techniques of mass action, strikes, boycotts, and civil disobedience on a wide scale, abandoning the appeals, petitions and deputations that had characterised ANC protests for more than forty years. Efforts at gentle suasion and pleas for patient waiting were cast aside as remnants of a bygone era. The degree of popular involvement in the anti-pass actions and the level of spontaneous activity in the rural areas was unparallelled in any other period of South African history. Finally, in the 1950s, the primary catalysts of the anti-pass protests were not the traditional male leaders, but thousands of African women, many of whom had never before been involved in political protests or demonstrations.
In the urban areas, the women`s campaigns were primarily organised by the ANC Women`s League and the nonracial Federation of South African Women. In the rural areas, resistance was largely spontaneous. Although the Government charged that the unrest was due to the work of "outside agitators", the rural women were, for the most part, acting on their own initiative and according to their own understanding of how the extension of the pass laws could affect their lives. While women who worked in the urban areas brought home new tactics, insights and information when they returned to the reserves, they were contributing to a momentum that had gathered on its own.
The militancy of the women, their level of organisation in the urban areas, and the ease with which they discarded their expected subordinate role came as a shock to many of the men and even to some of the women. Although women were deeply involved in all of the Congress campaigns of the 1950s, the leadership of the Congress organisations was dominated almost exclusively by men. (3)
As the women`s campaigns gathered strength, the ANC National Executive Committee pointedly acknowledged the role of women in the liberation struggle. It was obvious, from the wording of its statements, that the importance of women to the struggle had not previously been assumed. In its report to the Annual Conference of December 17-18, 1955, the ANC National Executive Committee remarked that the ANC Women`s League, which was formed in part to "take up special problems and issues affecting women", was not "just an auxiliary to the African National Congress, and we know that we cannot win liberation or build a strong movement without the participation of the women..." (4)
African women played a leading role in the resistance to pass legislation because of the particular way in which influx control measures, implemented through the pass system, affected their position in society as well as African family life. On the basis of race, African women suffered the same disabilities as African men. Because of their sex, however, they carried a double burden. At the bottom of the social and economic hierarchy, African women were predominantly employed in low-paying, unskilled jobs. Because of the tenuous nature of their employment - largely in the domestic service and informal sectors - African women were particularly vulnerable to removal from the urban areas as "idle" Africans or "superfluous appendages". Legal constraints made it far more difficult for African women than men to acquire urban residency rights, accommodations in the urban areas, and land in the African reserves. Influx control laws, and by extension the pass system, were intentionally used by government officials to bar African women from the urban areas and to confine them to the African reserves.
Life in the reserves was an existence of poverty and hardship for the vast majority of the people. Enforced landlessness had transformed African men from self-reliant peasants to migrant labourers in the white areas. Influx control laws meant that their families were forced to stay in the reserves, where the men could visit them once a year. The burden of raising children under such conditions, which fell almost exclusively on the women, became increasingly arduous. As the soil lost its fertility and landlessness became more acute, the reserve economy deteriorated. The women`s role as cultivators and providers eroded, and with it, women`s social status. Rather than being major contributors to the families` livelihood, women became increasingly dependent upon male earnings. However, these earnings were neither large nor secure. In many cases, money from the "white" areas came sporadically or not at all.
During the period that women were free from pass law restrictions, some had been able to skirt the influx control regulations and join their husbands in the urban areas. Some found menial jobs which, although low-paying and insecure, were more lucrative than subsistence farming. These women knew that the extension of passes to women would increase the effectiveness of the influx control system. No longer would there be an exit from the reserves, a way for women to earn money to feed their children or to live with their husbands in the urban areas. As a result, when in 1952 the Government announced that African women would be forced to carry passes, the women responded with vehemence. Subjection to pass law controls would destroy their last remaining hope - their freedom of movement. Unlike African men, the women who resisted these laws had nothing further to lose. Protesters in the rural areas were not risking the loss of urban residency rights, houses or jobs. They could afford to be bold where men were apt to be hesitant. The women could only gain by their militancy.
Resistance to the pass laws was the overwhelming, but not the only issue of the 1950s. African women became involved in a number of campaigns focussing on issues that affected their ability to care for their children and to keep their family unit together. They protested the pass laws, "Bantu" education, rent hikes, bus fare increases, forced removals of African communities, government-owned beer halls that soaked up their husbands` wages and laws that prevented them from selling home brew, an important source of income for many women. In the rural areas, women resisted the Government`s "betterment" schemes, which included the mandatory culling of precious livestock, required women to fill and maintain cattle dipping tanks without pay, and enforced soil conservation measures which dispossessed many families of arable land.
the rest is here...
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The two women were brutally assaulted and injured. From the looks of it a systematic method of torture and attempted murder was carried out on Kahentinetha. They knew what they were doing to them. They were trying to cause severe injury or death. Kahentinetha suffered a trauma induced heart attack, from which she is still recuperating.
John H. Sims, Deputy Attorney General of Canada [Phone 613-946-2774 Fax 613-952-6006], answered that the allegations “have no relevance” to the constitution of Canada and he has “no jurisdiction” and “no knowledge”. He admits the two women were at the border at 2:00 p.m. on that day, that they were “forcibly removed from their car”, “handcuffed” [without reason or charge] and taken into the Customs building. They were assaulted outside and inside in front of many witnesses, with at least a dozen CBSA cameras taping the whole incident from every angle. They have been denied access to the “live feed” which would prove that they were peaceful and did nothing wrong.
The two women are defending and representing themselves. In an unprecedented move, Vincent Veilleux and Marieke Bouchard, on behalf of John Sims, demanded the two victims pay them $19,460.00. This is known as a “motion to swindle and discourage”. Canada is demanding the two unemployed grandmothers pay them for their “preparation and filing of all their defences, replies, records, materials, appearances, meetings, conferences, other “ambulance chasers” they talked to, trial preparations [even though there is no trial], prepping the witnesses, subpoenas, secretaries, travel between Ottawa and Montreal and maybe even their cleaning bill after a night on the town in Montreal. Remember, these ambulance chasers are all highly paid government employees. What happens if a judge grants them the right to rake us over the coals?
Canada tried to justify their violent acts and violations of human rights. Their response was weak and followed by attempted extortion of money from their victims, knowing full well these women are unemployed. The two women replied on October 9th that they were defending themselves against almost a dozen burly and well-armed guards who attacked them when they were not threatening anyone or doing anything illegal.
There were obstacles at every turn. They drafted their response and took it to the Federal Court of Canada in Montreal for filing. The employees informed them they had to swear their affidavits and serve it on Canada. Luckily, a kind hearted older lawyer was standing close by who agreed to do it for them. He then offered his nearby office to make the numerous copies that were needed for filing and distribution.
Then they had to go to another part of town to the Justice Department to serve the Attorney General of Canada. They were put through an array of security and surveillance scrutiny until they were finally allowed to go up to the 12th floor. They walked off the elevator into a large empty room with a bullet proof window to the right and no one on the other side of it. They made calls on a pager hanging over the window. After waiting for a while a few people got off the elevator and they asked them for help. Eventually the right person came to the window. She took the documents, ruffled through them, checked them and then stamped them. She took a copy and told them it was now served on the Attorney General of Canada. She gave the rest back to the women and told them to go back to the Federal Court to file them.
They went down to the food court and had a bite to eat before heading back to the Federal Court.
This took a whole day. This maze could discourage people from suing the federal government to get real justice. They are not discouraged. According to the time frames in the Federal Court Act, Canada must respond in 4 days, by October 16, 2008.
As well, Kahentinetha asked the Ontario Provincial Police, the RCMP, the United Nations, the Attorney General of Canada and the Akwesasne Mohawk to investigate this attack. The OPP and RCMP stated this is not “their jurisdiction”. The UN has not responded. The Akwesasne Mohawk Police are not sure what to do. The Attorney General has turned it over to the CBSA to investigate themselves.
The women now have to file an “affidavit of evidence” within 30 days on the Attorney General of Canada. Then it goes to a judge who then takes his good old time. Is there anyone out there who can offer advice on how to deal with this kaleidoscope of mirrors that is designed to obfuscate and deprive those who can’t afford to use their system? This wild goose chase proves the system creates injustice for people like us. It’s made by and for the well-heeled colonists. We Indigenous people have to be persistent.
MNN Mohawk Nation News www.mohawknationnews.com
Ia:hawi needs your support. Katenies20@yahoo.com kahentinetha2@yahoo.com
Note: These challenges of abuses at the border require support and money. Your financial help is needed. Please send donations to PayPal at www.mohawknationnews.com, or by check or money order to “MNN Mohawk Nation News”, Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0. Nia:wen thank you very much.
Some of the culprits: Phil Fontaine of the AFN is a partner in CBSA’s Sustainable Development Strategy 2007-9, See Appendix 4 for external stakeholders; Chris Kealey, Canada Customs Excise, Immigration Taxation Board, CBSA Media Relations 613-991-5197; President CBSA 613-952-3200, 613-957-0612, CBSA-ASFC@Canada.gc.ca; National Aboriginal Initiative CHRC 204-983-2189 1-866-772-4880 info.com@chrc-ccdp.ca; Canada Customs Port of Entry at Cornwall Island Ontario; Gaetan Cousineau, Quebec Human Rights presidence@cdpdj.gc.ca; Akwesasne Mohawk Police 613-575-2250 ex 2400; Mohawk Security at the border 613-932-5183, 613-575-2340; Lance Markel, District Director CBSA 613-930-3234, 613-991-1214; Brent Lafave, Investigator CBSA; Susan St. Clair, Canadian Human Rights Commission, 344 Slater, Ottawa 613-995-1151, 1-888-214-1090, 613-943-5188; CBSA National Spokesperson 613-957-6500; Quebec Media Relations CBSA 514-350-6130; Chief Mohawk Council Akwesasne 613-575-2250 nbenedict@akwesasne.ca; Minister Stockwell Day, Ottawa 613-995-4432; Melissa Leclair Communications Pub. Safety 613-991-2863.
Posted by MNN Mohawk Nation News www.mohawknationnews.com Contact: katenies20@yahoo.com kahentinetha2@yahoo.com
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