Ahousaht Intervention

On behalf of the Saugeen Ojibway Nation (SON), OKT successfully sought leave to intervene in the reconsideration of the Ahousaht case in the British Columbia Court of Appeal.  At stake in this case is how robustly will Canadian courts protect the constitutional rights of Aboriginal communities to commercial fishing.  In addition to the Province of BC, and a fishing industry group, both of which already had intervener status, four parties applied for intervener status in July 2012 – two First Nations and two fishing industry groups.  The Court examined these four applications closely and issued reasons for judgement ten pages long.  The Saugeen Ojibway Nation was the only one of these four to succeed.  This intervention application was argued by Senwung Luk of OKT.

The appeal will be heard in February in Vancouver.  OKT is looking forward to presenting the views of the SON there.

By Roger Townshend