I would like to take this time to welcome everyone to the 30th anniversary of Treaty Day.

For 30 years we have come together to celebrate our Treaty Relationship and the continued importance of honoring and acknowledging the Peace and Friendship Treaties.

Looking back on the first treaty day in 1986, it was meant not only to remind government of our sacred agreements made centuries earlier but to also helped the Grand Council and the Mi’kmaw Leadership communicate with our people that our Treaties were “in fact and in law”still valid.

The Simon decision reversed generations of treaty denial, where everyone tried to ignore the treaties and prevent the Mi’kmaq from accessing their rights.

The Simon decision was the major turning point for the Mi’kmaw people, because at the time there were only a hand few of Mi’kmaw crazy enough to believe that Courts in Canada would actually proclaim our treaties as valid.

I think of people like Reg Maloney, My Father Alex Denny, Donald Marshall Sr., Joe B. Marshall, Sakej Henderson and Alex Christmas, Viola Robinson as people who against all odds believed that we could prevail in the courts.

Now more then 30 years later not only do we as Mi’kmaq acknowledge the importance of Treaties, but just last year the province ensured that Treaty Education would be a major part of the future of the Nova Scotia Education System.

In many ways we have come a long way, a prime example of that ...

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