This summer, René Lévesque would have been 100 years old. Until August 24th, anniversary date, The duty highlights on all its platforms the memory of the founder of the Parti Québécois, one of the greatest prime ministers in the history of Quebec.
Kuujjuaq was still called Fort-Chimo when René Lévesque set foot there in 1964 to meet Inuit representatives from northern Quebec.
“It was the first meeting of a Quebec minister — it was yours truly who was Minister of Natural Resources — with the representatives of all the villages of the North”, he recalled in November 1983, during a parliamentary commission on Indigenous rights.
The Quebec state was then absent from the territory which was annexed there in 1912 following a decision by the federal government. In 1939, Quebec had even obtained a decision from the Supreme Court ruling that the Inuit came under the authority of Ottawa.
After this judgment rendered while Maurice Duplessis was Prime Minister, it was not until the early 1960s and the coming to power of Jean Lesage’s Liberals that the situation began to change.
René Lévesque then created within his Ministry of Natural Resources the Direction générale du Nouveau-Québec (DGNQ), named after the region at the time. In Kuujjuaq, in 1964, he offered Inuit leaders a different approach from that of Ottawa. “At that time, there was a kind of tendency of the federal government to try to uproot them towards the South. We didn’t believe it was normal, ”he explained almost 20 years later in a parliamentary committee.
A boost to recognition
For the anthropologist Louis-Jacques Dorais, renowned for his work on the Inuit language, the politician wanted Quebec to exercise its powers in education, health and social services in the north of its territory, in order to replace the federal government.
“It was not normal that, in a territory that was half of Quebec, Quebec was almost absent,” he said.
Lévesque’s approach, although colonialist, was less paternalistic than that of the federal government, notes the researcher. The Quebec minister has also given impetus to the recognition of the Inuit.
“On the cultural level, the federal government considered that the Inuit should become Canadians like the others: speak English, have schools where they were taught the same things as in the South,” explains Mr. Dorais. “There was not this sensitivity to the preservation of the Inuit language and culture that René Lévesque, the DGNQ and his government had. »
The annual report of the Ministry of Natural Resources for the year 1963-1964 also indicates that the objective of the DGNQ education program is to prepare the Inuit “to assume the management of his own affairs”.
In the 1960s, the DGNQ set up schools where teaching was done in Inuktitut during the first three years of elementary school, and then in English or French, as desired. The federal government, which until then only offered education in English, then did the same.
Federal resistance
Philippe Hébert represented the DGNQ in Ivujivik from 1971 to 1976. As a community development officer, he says that the Inuit were surprised by Quebec’s initiative to offer education in Inuktitut. “It was so new and unheard of. People did not understand why Quebec wanted to do this,” he recalls.
The arrival of the Quebec government in the North was not easy. The federal Department of Indian Affairs resisted before concretely handing over to Quebec the responsibilities falling within its areas of jurisdiction. An agreement had however been concluded in this sense as early as 1964. “Indian Affairs was not in too much of a hurry. It was the chicanery of the English-speaking world and the French-speaking world in the North, ”says Mr. Hébert.
After the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA) was signed in 1975, the Kativik School Board was given the management of Nunavik schools.
Zebedee Nungak, former president of the Makivik corporation, which represents the interests of the Inuit, affirms however that the inhabitants of Nunavik suffered from the sovereignist ambitions of Mr. Lévesque when he took the reins of the Quebec government in 1976. And this situation continues, according to him. “We were not beaten on the Plains of Abraham in 1759, but we remain stuck in the permanent conflict between Quebec and Canada,” he laments. He also criticizes the Government of Quebec for having ignored Nunavik for the 50 years following its annexation.
While he acknowledges that René Lévesque was the first to take an interest in Nord-du-Québec, his judgment remains final: “I cannot tell you about any memorable historical benefit that can be attributed to the attitude of the Quebec towards the Inuit. »
Thirst for autonomy
The Parti Québécois has had at least one member in Nunavik, Taamusi Qumaq, a resident of Puvirnituq known for writing an Inuktitut dictionary and for his rejection of the JBNQA. “He went to a PQ rally and he spoke with an interpreter,” says Louis-Jacques Dorais, who knew him well.
In his autobiography, Qumaq recounts his meeting with Lévesque in Kuujjuaq, in 1964, with the other Inuit representatives. The minister had discussed their political autonomy and the importance of white people working in Inuit communities speaking Inuktitut. “Because of what he said, he became my companion, my friend, and I love him very much,” Qumaq writes. His words were an inspiration to me, more than those of any other government officials, because he was willing to help aboriginal peoples as well as his own people. »
In November 1983, Lévesque and Qumaq met again with other Aboriginal leaders, this time in a parliamentary commission at the National Assembly. On this occasion, Lévesque had agreed to negotiate the creation of an autonomous government for Nunavik, within Quebec. “There was a wave of euphoria at the Red Room,” recalls Georges Filotas, an Inuit language specialist who acted as interpreter that evening.
It will be necessary to wait until 2011 for a proposal to be submitted to the Inuit by referendum, an offer which was however rejected. According to Louis-Jacques Dorais, this is mainly because the laws of a Nunavik government would have been subordinated to those of Canada and Quebec, as well as to the provisions of the JBNQA: “The only real right it gave them, it was a right of veto on any development project on their territory. »
Former Secretary General of the Quebec government, Louis Bernard remembers having accompanied the Prime Minister during a trip to Puvirnituq. Lévesque loved the spontaneity of the Inuit, he recalls. “Rarely have I seen him so content, so happy as during this stay with the Inuits,” he says. He had a very interesting personal relationship with them. »