Desert Rock protesters converge on council

Calvin Johnson, left, president of the C-Aquifer for Dine', leads others in chants against the use of water by Peabody during a protest Monday in front of the Navajo Nation Council Chambers in Window Rock. [Photo by Jeffery Jones/Independent]

By Kathy Helms
Dine Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — Grassroots groups took to the street Monday in a unity march to protest construction of more coal-fired power plants and the use of Navajo water to mine and slurry coal while Navajo families do without.

Though at times divided in their activism efforts in the past, Monday's march signaled the joining of resistance forces: Dooda Desert Rock Committee, Diné CARE, C-Aquifer for Diné, Diné Bidziil, and Black Mesa Water Coalition.

Norman Brown of Diné Bidziil said Monday's showing is just a beginning. "There is going to be a unification of the grassroots. It's just a matter oftime," he said, adding that the union is needed to bring about government reform.

Basing the Navajo Nation government on a broken, divisive Western system of government is getting old. "We need a system that unifies us. We need a formed government that brings our families together, not divides them.

"That hogan (council chamber), the family is divided in that hogan. This is not a harmonious family. There are some real problems," Brown said.

Winds of change
"If the council is not going to create the change, the people will create the change. If the council can't follow the rules, then the people will make the rules," he said.

Several council delegates met with Dooda elders Monday morning prior to the march. Members of Dooda Desert Rock are seeking 20 minutes of council's time during the winter session to present their issues.

Brown said the "old guard" remaining in power, historically, has never united the nation. "Never. There are already sides being chosen now. I saw that today. We're going back to the old days. We don't want the old days."

The grassroot organizations want change in the Navajo Nation Council leadership, as well as a re-examination of all the chairmen of the standing committees, according to Brown.

"The president already stirred up opposition just by talking. For the past four years, the Speaker of the Navajo Nation Council didn't bring the Nation together. I don't believe today's example is an indication that he will work with the Executive Office.

"It's the same-old, same-old. We don't want the same-old, same-old. We want change," Brown said.

Back home again
On Saturday, Dooda Desert Rock resisters abandoned the site to which they had been relocated by Navajo Nation Police following the issuance of a court injuction to keep them from blocking the access road to BHP Billiton's Navajo Mine and the proposed Desert Rock site.

Elouise Brown, president of the Dooda committee, said elders and other resisters braved the snow to relocate their campsite to Alice Gilmore's sheep camp near the mine.

"The cops gave us the hardest time, but we got it our way and moved back," she said.

Gilmore's sheep camp and the proposed Desert Rock site appear to be located within Gilmore's customary use area, according to topographical maps shown Dooda Desert Rock Committee attorney, Jim Zion, by members of Gilmore's family.

"If the information given to me about Alice Gilmore's customary use area boundaries is correct, then the United States government and the Navajo Nation have given permissions to trespass on Mrs. Gilmore's customary use area without her permission (as I understand it)," Zion wrote in a Jan. 6 legal opinion to Elouise Brown.

Zion said the injunction issued Jan. 3 by Shiprock District Court does not exclude Dooda Desert Rock and those associated with it from the area. "It prohibits it and others from interfering with work there, not entering the area," he said. It also binds the parties and those "associated" with them.

Who's trespassing?
"To the extent that Navajo Nation police officers are in the area, the injunction binds them, and they would be included in the category of persons who are required to follow Navajo Nation law, including the criminal trespass, criminal entry, and trespass with force or violence statutes ... ," Zion wrote.

Zion said the location of any camp erected and maintained by the Dooda Desert Rock Committee would be determined by Alice Gilmore if that camp is within the boundaries of her customary use area.

He added that Gilmore "has the legal authority to request anyone to leave her customary use area, for the purposes of the criminal entry statute."

"Any obstruction of siting the camp, as an aspect of the exercise of your right to freedom of assembly, would be a violation of civil rights guaranteed by the Navajo Nation Bill of Rights.

"Any such violation could be the basis for a damage action against the Navajo Nation, individual officers, or both," Zion said.