PARTICIPANTS

The Hon. Stephen Kakfwi, Northwest Territories

Stephen Kakfwi was elected as Premier of the 14th Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories on January 17, 2000. First elected in 1987, he is serving his fourth term in the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories representing the Sahtu Constituency. He is a recipient of the 1997 Aboriginal Achievement Award for Public Service.

Mr. Kakfwi has held portfolios in Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Education, Housing, Safety and Public Services, Aboriginal Rights, Personnel, Workers' Compensation Board and Justice. He was responsible for the amalgamation of Renewable Resources, Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources, and Economic Development and Tourism to create the new Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development in 1996. As Minister of Justice he created a new probation services division and established the advisory committee to assist with the design of a new adult correctional institutional and two young offenders facilities.

He is the former President of the Dene Nation, an aboriginal organization composed of status and non- status Dene people living throughout the Western Arctic.

Born near Fort Good Hope, a small community on the shores of the Mackenzie River, Mr. Kakfwi attended residential school in Inuvik, Yellowknife and Fort Smith. He is the first Aboriginal Minister of National Constitutional Affairs in Canada.

As head of the Dene Nation, he guided the Dene/Metis land claims discussions, spearheaded the creation of the Dene Cultural Institute, established the organization known as Indigenous Survival International, initiated and organized the visit of Pope John Paul II in 1984 and 1987 on behalf of aboriginal peoples of Canada. Mr. Kakfwi was formerly a board member of the NWT Housing Corporation and a member of the federal Energy Options Committee. He was past Chairman of the Constitutional Development Steering Committee, a group of northern political representatives established to negotiate a new form of public government in the western Territories.

As Minister of Education, Mr. Kakfwi established regional Divisional Boards of Education in the West and established a leadership school for high school students devoted to achieving excellence.

As Minister of National Constitutional Affairs, Mr. Kakfwi was the lead minister in constitutional negotiations at the national level, achieving a significant breakthrough on aboriginal and territorial issues in the Charlottetown Accord. Mr. Kakfwi has continued his lobby on behalf of trappers, travelling on several occasions in the past few years to meet with European parliamentarians in an attempt to combat the anti- fur lobby.

As Minister of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Mr. Kakfwi worked vigorously, along with his colleagues, to create a secondary diamond industry in the Northwest Territories and concluded the work to establish a Protected Areas Strategy.

He was an outspoken critic of proposed federal gun-control legislation in respect to the impact it would have on the traditional use of firearms by hunters in the Northwest Territories. As Premier, Mr. Kakfwi will continue to oversee the work to bring the negotiations on devolution and resource revenue sharing to a successful conclusion.

Mr. Kakfwi and his wife, Marie Wilson make their home in Yellowknife, N.W.T., with daughters Kyla, Daylyn and son Keenan.