Saskatchewan First Nation awarded nearly $127M in decades-long land claim settlement

A First Nation near North Battleford, Sask., has been awarded about $127 million in a decades-long land claim settlement.

In 1905, the Mosquito, Grizzly Bear’s Head, Lean Man First Nation lost over 5,800 hectares of reserve land. In 2014 it claimed the federal government illegally took and sold the land in the Battlefords area.

Ottawa denied the claim, but in 2017 the federal government agreed the loss was “invalid.”

The settlement comes from a land valuation, assessed through to Dec. 31, 2019.

In a statement to Global News, Chief Tanya Aguilar-Antiman said the nation is “deliberating possible options for the best interest of the nation.”