In the summer of 2019, Bear’s Den All Nations Traditional Medicine Sweat Lodge opened with a lot of noise. The Vice Governor of Ontario attended the festivities on the lawn in front of Michael Garron Hospital in Toronto. These included the Federal Minister for Indigenous Peoples of the Crown, two local Liberal MPs, a representative of Mississauga’s First Nation on Skugog Island and members of the Juno Award-winning rock band The Arkells.
After prayers, speeches and the cutting of the ribbon, they all gathered together for a photo with the guest of honor with an eagle feather, Ernest Matton, the elder of Metis, also named Mohawk Ateshsa Niokva: rita: a – Little Brown Bear.
Almost three years later, all that’s left of the sweat hut is a “Thank you” sign and a few orange ribbons tied to a chain link fence. The hospital closed its Aboriginal treatment program.
And Matton, Michael Garron’s director of Aboriginal education, programs, and culture, also disappeared after his sudden retirement in early May – after members of the Toronto Indigenous community began raising questions about whether he was the one to whom he introduces himself.
Matton, 64, first started working for Michael Garron as a Certified Addiction Advisor in 2012. For a decade, he helped the hospital expand its reach to the city’s indigenous people by taking over as program manager in 2018 promoted to director in 2020
He collected awards – winning the Order of Ontario and the Sovereign’s Medal for Volunteers, even to star in a documentary. And he won a place The Ontario Solar List of civil servants who receive more than $ 100,000 a year.
But as Matton’s profile grew, so did the chatter in indigenous circles, where many came to question his mixture of potpourri from the teachings of the First Nations and even his origins.
Unanswered questions, doubts raised
Dean Hupfield, a local educator and Pauau dancer, first met Matton a few years ago at the YMCA in Toronto, where he was lecturing on the Teachings of the Seven Grandfathers of her Ojibwe nation.
“He taught a lot of non-native people about my culture,” Hupfield recalls. “And then I saw his [ribbon] shirt, with its small inscription Métis on it. And I said to myself, “This is interesting. Who is this person? I don’t know who this man is. And I’ve been in the local community for many years and I’m quite connected all over Canada. “
Dean Hupfield writes to Michael Garron Hospital asking questions about Matton’s origins. The Ojibway teacher and dancer says she found his mix of scientists and lack of community connections suspicious. (Derek Hooper / CBC)
Last year, after two friends expressed their concerns about Matton, Hupfield began connecting to his extensive Facebook network to see if anyone else knew Elder Little Brown Bear and where he came from.
“No one knew who he was. The mestizo community could not accommodate him, “said Hupfield.
Now, concealing suspicions that Matton was “self-assembling,” Hupfield wrote to Michael Garron Hospital to ask what steps had been taken to verify his identity before putting him in charge of their treatment program. She received an initial response from the hospital, but heard nothing else.
CBC News spoke with three other members of the community, who also expressed concern about Matton in the hospital, with no visible effect.
“I’m not happy. They swept him under the rug. They never followed me,” Hupfield said. “I think it’s very convenient that he’s retiring now.”
When approached by CBC News, Matton declined to be interviewed, citing concerns about the family’s health.
Sarah Downey, president and chief executive of the hospital, Michael Garron, also declined to be interviewed, but gave a detailed statement after receiving Matton’s consent to share his personal information.
“When we first learned about several members of the community’s concerns about the local identity of Elder Little Brown Bear, we took the issue very seriously,” Downey wrote. “We immediately set out with him to investigate the situation and take the necessary steps to verify its origin.”
Matton provided the hospital with a copy of a citizenship card issued by the Métis Nation of Ontario (MNO) and a letter from the Barrie-South Simcoe Métis Council certifying that he is currently on their register and acting as their elder.
However, Downey acknowledged that the evidence provided was unclear. This is because Matton has not yet officially confirmed his claims about Metis’ legacy to the satisfaction of the MNO.
Incomplete file with Métis Nation
In 2017, the Metis nation of Ontario began a process of vetting its 24,000 members in preparation for self-government, requiring those who claimed historical ties to the community to document those ties with things like birth certificates, marriage certificates, records of Census and Hudson Bay Company Records.
About 5,400 members were assessed as “incomplete” files, including Matton, according to a hospital statement.
Five years later, 5,300 of these people still have to establish a paper trail and receive new MNO membership cards, which entitle them to receive benefits agreed with the government or to hold elected positions in the organization. This summer, the MNO will discuss its next steps, including the possible expulsion of those who remain untested.
Margaret Fro, president of the Métis Nation in Ontario, will not speak specifically about Matton’s case, but told CBC News that clearing the list of members is a “major problem” for the organization.
The MNO has tried to make the verification process simple and painless, she said, by creating a genealogical database that tracks more than 100 recognized family lines from communities that emerged in the mid to late 1700s.
“I know there were many people who wrote and spoke about the ancestors of the first nation in the 1600s. They will not be counted, “said Fro. “In fact, you have to show Metis’ ancestor in historical records.
“We are a separate indigenous people. We have a unique history, culture, language, traditions,” she added.
WATCH The President of the MNO discusses the impact of fraudulent allegations on the identity of indigenous peoples:
MNO President Margaret Fro on the Impact of Fraudulent Indigenous Identity Claims
The president of the Metis Nation of Ontario, Margaret Fro, will not speak specifically about Matton’s case, but says the deceptive allegations of local heritage are “unacceptable” and “hurt our communities.”
Along with his alleged legacy of mestizos, Matton at various times speaks of a grandmother who has Oklahoma Cheyenne blood, and often refers to the Dahaji, an elder of a Mohawk from Wahta, near Bala, Ont., Of whom he speaks. that she adopted him into Bear Clan and became his spiritual mentor.
Matton did not answer written questions about these aspects of his legacy, and CBC News’s attempts to independently verify these allegations were unsuccessful.
Matton still serves as an elder and advisor to the Métis Council of Barry-South Simco, head of the Métis nation in Ontario.
“The older little brown bear is an accepted person in the Bari community and he is doing very well,” said the group’s volunteer president, Roxana Shank. “He has won the Vice Governor’s Award, among other things, for his community service.”
Shank said Matton’s name remains on the citizenship lists she receives from the MNO, and that she considers him a full member until that changes. Given this status, she said she doubted why his position at the Michael Garron Hospital had ever become a problem, raising the specter of bias against Metis.
“I think people think that Metis status is somehow derived. It’s not, “Shank said. “I think it’s important to emphasize this point. We are not Miller Lite – nothing. We are not “pretentious”. We are Metis and we are unique. “
Matton held a pipe ceremony during the National Truth and Reconciliation Day event at Michael Garron Hospital Lawn on September 30, 2021. Sarah Downey, the hospital’s chief executive and lieutenant governor of Ontario. Elizabeth Dowdswell, both seated on the right, was among the dignitaries present. (Michael Garron Hospital)
Indigenous identities have become a complex issue in recent months, with a number of high-ranking figures facing accusations that they exaggerated or even fabricated their ties to the communities of the first nations, the Inuit or the mestizos.
Assistance is needed to verify his identity, the hospital said
Downey, the hospital’s chief executive Michael Garron, says employers need guidance and help from these communities when it comes to verifying candidates’ legacies.
“Colonial institutions in the private and public sectors could benefit from many local governments that set clear standards and a proper procedure for determining evidence for the local population,” she wrote. “We would welcome these policies and processes to support local screening in our recruitment and employment practices.”
But Pam Palmater, a department of local government management at the University of Toronto Metropolitan, says the problem is long-standing, fueled largely by institutional indifference.
“Indigenous people are trying to get government departments, universities, award shows to deal with this. But they have always refused,” Palmater said. “They always said to themselves, ‘Oh well, everyone can identify as they please.’ And that’s just not the case. “
The damage done by fraudsters could be real, Palmater said, especially in sectors such as healthcare.
“You target people who are most vulnerable. “They are looking for a local counselor or a protector for local patients, or someone to talk about spirituality or local medicine,” she said.
“If you make a fake, you won’t get any of it. At best, you get a really problematic mix of Wikipedia, Google Search, and general, stereotypical things about local people that don’t really match a particular culture or practice. “
(Michael …
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