Help from Above
How aboriginal leaders can promote healing in native communities
BY Devon Babin
Photography by Scott Foster/PoliticsWatch
Former Northwest Territories premier Stephen Kakfwi (at right), best known as a staunch advocate for the Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline, is on his way to being known for something else. He is speaking up about the abuse he suffered as a child and is encouraging other prominent native leaders to do the same.
The 55-year-old Kakfwi spoke about the issue at the National Indigenous Sexual Abuse Conference in Edmonton late this past winter. His hope is that other leaders will follow in his footsteps and begin dealing with their abuse, which they suffered at residential schools. “In order to be healthy people we need to heal, and we can’t heal if we don’t deal with the wounds that we have, and we need healthy leaders,” says Kakfwi.
Few native leaders have spoken up about what they endured, which Kakfwi says has caused a lot of torment for survivors and their families—including his own. “I come from a family that was torn apart by illness and alcoholism. I guess I’m just one of the walking wounded that somehow survived and made what looks externally like a good, successful life. But those that know me, like my wife and my children, know that I have issues that I need to deal with,” he says.
The healing process won’t start until communities and leaders address the issue, says Kakfwi, likening the process to the one that forced native communities to deal with rampant alcoholism. “There was a time in our history that our women and our community leaders forced us as political leaders to address the issue of alcohol,” he explains. “We always said, ‘Look, we have so much work to do. We’re busy. Let’s deal with some real issues.’ We never wanted to deal with the devastating impact that alcohol had on ourselves, on our families and our communities. But our people forced us to do it, and, as a result, many of us were forced to deal with it, and many of us quit drinking and I’m one of them.”
Kakfwi says he hopes to achieve the same momentum to deal with the legacy of sexual abuse. Today, he is semi-retired and spending time working through his own abuse. “There is a whole generation of us that are friends and are leaders who went through residential school, and it is time to deal with it,” he says.
