"Native Population Won't Celebrate This Anniversary"

OHSWEKEN - At the recent Drumbeat Conference I was reminded once again why the native people of North, South and Central America regard the coming celebration of the 500th anniversary of Columbus' Great Discovery with little enthusiasm.

This conference, was held for three days at McMaster University and for one day at the Woodland Indian Cultural Centre in Brantford. The speakers came from many parts of Canada and the U.S. There was also one speaker from El Salvador in Central America.

These native speakers told many different stories of what had happened and was still happening to their people. Yet, although the stories were different in detail, what had happened to these indigenous people was essentially the same. English or Spanish-speaking people had come into the territory of the aboriginal people first as visitors, then as settlers, and soon by force or trickery they had become the bosses. Whether is was happening to the Lubicon Cree in Canada or the Mayan and Nahuatl people of El Salvador, the underlying sameness of their sad tales was striking.

Yet although the stories were sad, they were also full of hope and resolution. After almost 500 years of the most cruel domination, many, many aboriginal people of Central American countries still converse on the streets of their towns and villages in their native tongues. I used to naively believe that everybody "down there" spoke Spanish. A young man from southern Mexico, whom I met last year, said that in his home territory only 10 per cent of the people could speak Spanish or wanted to.

At the Drumbeat Conference, the native speaker from El Salvador told of a Nahuatl uprising in 1932 organized by a chief from the western zone. The result was a huge massacre of 32,000 native people which lasted for two weeks. There were numerous smaller massacres of 25, 50 or 100 people by government troops until they were satisfied with all the leaders were killed.

The government troops are well-supplied with arms from the U.S. Those in positions of power are all white people. People with darker faces, such as native people, are regarded as enemies and treated accordingly. It is very dangerous to be a native person in Central and South America today. Wearing long hair and Indian clothing in many cities means you are almost sure to get picked up by the police. And many people who are detained are tortured or just disappear.

You may have noticed that I did not mention the speaker from El Salvador by name. That is because he uses a pseudonym. He could easily disappear when he gets back to El Salvador if the police or army heard about him.

The rich ruling class, which stays rich by paying slave labor wages, accuses anyone who opposes them of being communists. They keep a very conservative-type government in power and control the army with well-paid generals who will do their bidding.

The indigenous native people of Central America live near where Columbus landed and thought he had reached India. For almost 500 years they have lived under oppression by the conquerors. In 1992 they will have the least to be thankful for.