National Indigenous Veterans Day is observed annually on Nov. 8 to honour the contributions of Indigenous veterans and the roles they played for Canada.
The Saskatchewan First Nations Veterans Association (SFNVA) works to bring equality to the province’s Indigenous veterans, recognize their sacrifices, preserve the history of Indigenous veterans and redress historical wrongdoing.
“The association is very important because it was initially developed to fight for the rights of Indigenous veterans in Canada,” said Robin Cote, the SFNVA president – South Branch. “We can’t really fully understand why the association was developed until we understand the Indian Act of 1876 and what enfranchisement meant to First Nations people across Canada.”
Cote, who is also a veteran, says she’s fortunate she did not lose her Indian status. Indigenous veterans who enlisted to serve for Canada were forced to give up their Indigenous ancestry and their rights as First Nations people.
“A lot of the World War I, World War II and Korean veterans came back, and they weren’t allowed to go back to their First Nations,” she said. “Some of them actually lost their First Nation status.”
According to the Veterans Affairs Canada website, there was a dark side of how the Canadian government treated these communities.
“Canada expropriated hundreds of thousands of acres of reserve lands during this era. Some of their land was also taken and given to non-Indigenous people as part of a program that granted farmland to returning veterans,” the website read. “The government typically denied this reestablishment program to Indigenous veterans, and also treated them unfairly in other ways.”
Indigenous veterans were denied full access to benefits compared with non-Indigenous veterans. The SFNVA’s mandate is to be the voice for Indigenous veterans in the province.
“We have this day to recognize our Indigenous veterans and their sacrifice for the country,” Cote said. “I think moving forward … there are citizens that really need to understand what the Indian Act means and what it has done to our people across the nation.”
Cote and SFNVA Grand Chief Robin Dawatsare were elected in their roles last month.