First Nation wants cash for De Beers mine

The Deninu K'ue First Nation says diamond giant De Beers owes it money for the Snap Lake Mine operation in the Northwest Territories.

The Deninu K'ue — northeast of Fort Resolution on the shore of Great Slave Lake — may be too far away from the mine to have an Impacts Benefit Agreement, or IBA, with the company, but Chief Louis Balsillie says the First Nation still has the right to compensation.

The Snap Lake Mine is about 220 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife.

Deninu K'ue are the only members of the Akaitcho Dene Treaty 8 First Nations without a Snap Lake IBA, Balsillie said. 

De Beers has signed agreements with Yellowknives Dene First Nation in Ndilo, Yellowknives Dene First Nation in Dettah and Lutsel K'e First Nation in Lutsel K'e.

Deninu K'ue has hired a lawyer to try to ensure its positioned for a benefits agreement if De Beers's proposed Gahcho Kue mine is built at Kennady Lake, about 80 kilometres southeast of the Snap Lake Mine.

But Balsillie says the First Nation wants its own agreement for Snap Lake as well, including compensation for the two and a half years the mine has been in operation.

"We're poor because we don't get that extra funding from the mining companies, but yet we sit at the same table as everybody else," he said. "And the other communities get the IBAs, we don't. And that's hurtful because we should be, as a nation, stronger together."

Money split for Ekati mine

Balsillie says the Lutsel K'e First National gives Deninu K'ue $250,000 a year, half the compensation Lutsel K'e receives from BHP Billiton for the Ekati diamond mine, about 310 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife.  

Linda Vanden Berg, an anthropologist who spent more than two years researching the history of Deninu K'ue, says it should be genealogy, not geography, that proves entitlement.

"Lutsel K'e and Deninu K'ue band members are descended from the same ancestors," she said. "Identical ancestors. How do you say that you're going to do an Impact Benefits Agreement with one and not the other group?"

De Beers says many factors go into the decision about which communities get IBAs, including historical occupancy of the land, treaties, land claims and how the land is used now.

Company spokeswoman Cathie Bolstad says De Beers talked with Deninu K'ue during the regulatory process and made it clear the community would not get an IBA.

"The company did not identify any current uses of the lands or resources in the project area by the Deninu K'ue," she said.