This conversation with the late Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney, Canada's 18th Prime Minister, was originally posted in August 2020.

"Some people said, 'well there is racism in Canada but there is no systemic racism.' And to those people I said, 'You've clearly never read the Indian Act, because it reeks of systemic racism.'"

The Right Honorable Brian Mulroney, Canada's 18th Prime Minister, is National Chief Perry Bellegarde's guest on this latest episode of the Akhameyimok Podcast. They discuss climate change, overcoming systemic racism against First Nations people, the sweeping recommendations for change in the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, and the leadership lessons he learned in leading the international fight against the white minority Apartheid regime in South Africa and for the freedom of Nelson Mandela.

Brian Mulroney was Canada’s Prime Minister from 1984 to 1993. In that time he oversaw the negotiation and implementation of the US-Canada Free Trade agreement, and then NAFTA. He initiated important environmental reforms, including the Acid Rain treaty with the United States. He was also at the forefront of attempts to make the Canadian constitution more inclusive, trying to bring Quebec into the fold with the Meech Lake accord and then the Charlottetown Accord. He was Prime Minister during the Oka Crisis, thirty years ago this summer, which led his government to establish the Royal Commission on Aboriginal People. It made sweeping recommendations on how to restructure the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples.

A special thanks goes out to the Red Dog Singers of Treaty 4 territory in Saskatchewan for providing the theme music for this podcast.

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced in Ottawa by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions.

Bryan Trottier needs little introduction. The Hockey Hall of Fame player was a key member and leading scorer for the New York Islanders Stanley Cup dynasty of the 1980's, and then with Pittsburgh Penguins of the early 90's. He is also incredibly proud of his Cree-Metis-Chippewa heritage, and his hometown of Val Marie in southern Saskatchewan. In this fun and fascinating conversation, he talks with Perry Bellegarde about learning to play hockey on the beaver pond on his family ranch, playing bass in his father's country band, his parents advice on overcoming racism as a young hockey player, how the infamous Dave "Tiger" Williams saved his hockey career as a junior player at Swift Current, and of course, his key role in the NY Islanders Cup wins from 1980 to 1983. This is an interview to savour.

Bryan's new best selling memoir is called "All Roads Home: A Life On and Off the Ice."

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions in Ottawa.Our theme music is performed by the Red Dog Singers of Treaty Four Territory in Saskatchewan.

"We uncovered evidence of a police investigation in the 1930's at Kuper Island School where they interviewed dozens and dozens of children who had been sexually abused. That ended up going nowhere. The Catholic Church knew about it. The Department of Indian Affairs knew about it. The Attorney General in British Columbia knew about it. And yet no-one ended up being charged and the abuse continued. It's disturbing and shocking to find out these things could have been prevented."

Duncan McCue is one of Canada's leading investigative journalists. He is the host and creator of the CBC podcast series Kuper Island, and a proud member of the Chippewas of Georgina Island First Nation.

We're thrilled to have him on the podcast discussing his groundbreaking CBC podcast about the Kuper Island Indian Residential School.

Kuper Island has generated a huge audience in Canada and beyond and has topped multiple Best Podcasts lists for 2022. It is a smart, thoughtful, devastating and carefully reported story of one of Canada’s most notorious Indian residential schools.

The eight-part CBC series gives first person survivor accounts, and tells the stories of those who didn’t survive, as well as the stories of the men and women who carried out decades of systematic abuse against First Nations children forced to attend that institution.

This episode may be triggering for some listeners.

A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services 24 hours a day, seven days a week by calling: 1-866-925-4419.

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions in Ottawa.

Our theme music is performed by the Red Dog Singers of Treaty Four Territory in Saskatchewan.

Chief Perry is thrilled to be joined Douglas Sanderson and Andrew Stobo Sniderman for a fascinating and thoughtful conversation about their new book, "The Valley of the Birdtail."

It is a heart-rending, true story about racism and reconciliation.

Divided by a beautiful valley and 150 years of racism, the town of Rossburn and the Waywayseecappo Indian reserve have been neighbours nearly as long as Canada has been a country. Their story reflects much of what has gone wrong in relations between Indigenous Peoples and non-Indigenous Canadians. It also offers, in the end, an uncommon measure of hope.

DOUGLAS SANDERSON (AMO BINASHII) is the Prichard Wilson Chair in Law and Public Policy at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law and has served as a senior policy advisor to Ontario’s attorney general and minister of Indigenous affairs. He is Swampy Cree, Beaver clan, of the Opaskwayak Cree Nation.

ANDREW STOBO SNIDERMAN is a writer, lawyer, and Rhodes Scholar from Montreal. He has written for the New York Times, the Globe and Mail, and Maclean’s. He has also argued before the Supreme Court of Canada, served as the human rights policy advisor to the Canadian minister of foreign affairs, and worked for a judge of South Africa’s Constitutional Court.

And thanks to the Red Dog Singers for our theme song, Interbal.

"The survivors felt if this had been white children, the community wouldn't be the ones having to investigate their own genocide." - Kimberly Murray

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is back!

And for this return episode Chief Perry Bellegarde is thrilled to have Kimberly Murray as his guest. She is the new Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools. That appointment by the federal department of Justice came about after the heartbreaking discoveries of hundreds of unmarked children's graves in former Residential Schools at Kamloops, BC and at the Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan, and the hunt is on for more at dozens of former Residential School sites across the country.

In her discussion with Perry, Kimberly Murray talks about the technical challenges of searching for graves, overcoming hurdles put up by all levels of government and the police, what her role involves and enables her to do, and what justice looks like for the thousands of children who died from abuse, disease and neglect in Canada's Residential School system.

Kimberly Murray is a proud member of the Kanesatake Mohawk Nation. Before taking on her current role as Special Interlocutor, she was the Executive Director of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee from 2010 to 2015. And she was the Ontario’s first ever Assistant Deputy Attorney General for Aboriginal Justice. After that she led the search for unmarked graves at the Six Nations of the Grand River, working to recover the missing children and unmarked burial sites at the Mohawk Institute, which was Canada’s longest running residential school.

Ahkameyimok will continue to put out a new interview every couple of weeks, be sure to subscribe where you listen so you don't miss future episodes.

And be sure to follow on social media. Just search for @perrybellegarde

****As we move into 2022, we're reposting Perry's episode on Hope, one of the most popular of the past year. We hope it brings you joy and inspiration as we enter the New Year.****

***Encore Episode***

In his seven years as National Chief, Perry Bellegarde focused on the importance hope: "Always leave more hope in a room than was there when you arrived."

Over the run of the Ahkameyimok Podcast, no matter how difficult the conversation or the issue, he always ends by asking his guests this question:

What brings you hope?

These are some of his favorite answers to that question.

01: 18 -- Chief Willie Littlechild - former TRC Commissioner, Member of Parliament, lawyer, social activist and author of the first draft of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People.

02:24 Dr Lorna Williams - Canada's leading expert on the promotion and revival of Indigenous languages.

4:14 William Prince - Award winning and chart topping country music star

6:30 Rt Hon Brian Mulroney - Canada's 18th Prime Minister

7:40 Dr Dan Longboat - Founding Director of Trent University's Indigenous Environmental Science Program

10:42 Marion Crowe - CEO of the First Nations Health Managers Association

11:41 Wade Davis, best-selling author, film-maker, explorer, UBC Anthropology Professor

12:32 Mary Ellen Turpel Lafond - fmr judge, law professor, children's advocate

14:27 Jagmeet Singh - Leader of the federal New Democratic Party of Canada

15:13 Bobbie Jo Greenland-Morgan - Grand Chief of the Gwich'in Tribal Council

17:40 Kevin Loring - Artistic Director of the Indigenous Theatre, National Arts Centre, Ottawa

19:40 Elder Wilfred Buck - leading First Nations astronomy and star lore expert

21:52 Senator Kim Pate - international expert in legal and prison reform

24:01 Brigadier-General Joe Paul, the highest ranking First Nations officer in the Canadian Armed Forces

25:12 Brad Regehr - The first First Nations President of the Canadian Bar Association

26:21 Louise Bernice Halfe - Canada's first Indigenous Parliamentary Poet Laureate

28:05 Dr Alika Lafontaine - the first Indigenous person elected as the President of the Canadian Medical Association

30:03 Romeo Saganash, former Member of Parliament, and leading advocate for the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People.

31:41 Conner Roulette, First Nations gold medal winning junior hockey star

33:09 Chief Cadmus Delorme, Cowessess First Nation, home to 751 unmarked graves found at the Marieval Residential School

34:30 Tom Jackson, actor, musician, social activist

36:36 Marie Wilson, former Commissioner, Truth and Reconciliation Commission

The Akhameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions

Theme music is by the Red Dog Singers, Treaty 4 territory, Saskatchewan

A holiday message from Perry Bellegarde, with best wishes for the year ahead from Perry and the Ahkameyimok Podcast team.

*** In light of revelations that the NHL Chicago Blackhawks covered up a case of sexual abuse of one it's players by a member of it's coaching staff, we are re-posting this powerful interview with former NHL player and sexual abuse survivor Sheldon Kennedy. This interview originally aired in January, 13th, 2021. ***

***This interview contains subject matters and details that may not be appropriate for young listeners. ***

Sheldon Kennedy is one of Canada's leading campaigners in the fight against child abuse. The retired NHL veteran and founder of the Calgary Child Advocacy Centre joins National Chief Bellegarde to discuss ways in which the pandemic has made child abuse worse, what can be done to improve that, his own history of abuse by his hockey coach as a teenager, and how telling that story gave him the strength to get his own life on track and help others, including First Nations survivors of Residential Schools. And, on a lighter note, Kennedy talks about how winning CTV's Battle of the Blades renewed his love of skating.

Sheldon Kennedy played eight years in the National Hockey League, with the Detroit Red Wings, Calgary Flames and Boston Bruins. As a teenager he led the Swift Current Broncos to a Memorial Cup championship, the best team in Junior Hockey. But it was also at Swift Current that Kennedy was sexually abused for years by his coach, Graham James. When Kennedy revealed this abuse publicly towards the end of his pro career, Graham James was convicted and sent to prison. He has since been convicted for the abuse of several more players.

For Kennedy, this marked the start of a life dedicated to supporting and speaking out for sexual abuse survivors. His leadership, including founding the Child Advocacy Centre in Calgary and the Respect Group, saw him being awarded the Order of Canada in 2016.

A big thanks goes out to the Red Dog Singers of Treaty 4 Territory in Saskatchewan for our theme music.

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions.

*** In honour of the first ever National Day of Truth and Reconciliation on September 30th, we are re-posting this interview with Marie Wilson, who was a Commissioner on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission from 2009 to 2015. This interview was originally published June 3, 2021. ***

***The subject matter and content of this episode may be triggering for some listeners. The National Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line is accessible 24 hours a day at: 1-866-925-4419 ***

"We did hear of children's bones being found in the foundations of buildings when (Residential) schools were dismantled. We heard of children being thrown into furnaces. These were children. The little ones who have woken up in Kamloops this week, these are children calling out to all of us now."

Marie Wilson, former Commissioner on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which gathered testimony on the crimes and abuses against Indigenous children at Residential Schools in Canada, joins the Ahkameyimok Podcast from Yellowknife to discuss the shocking find of a mass grave of 215 children at the Kamloops Indian Residential School. The grave was found on the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School at the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation in British Columbia. Dr Wilson discusses her feelings on hearing of the the Kamloops mass grave, her memories of visiting that site as Commissioner, why her work on the TRC from 2009 to 2015 means she is shocked but not surprised by this mass grave and believes there are many more like it across Canada that need to be investigated, and why she believes the Pope and Catholic church, which ran the majority of the Residential Schools, needs to apologize for its role in what the TRC described as cultural genocide.

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions

Our theme music is performed by the Red Dog Singers, Treaty 6 Territory, Saskatchewan

***Encore Presentation***

***This interview with Dr Lorna Williams originally aired on Jan 21, 2021 ***

What is the state of First Nations languages in Canada? One of the leading experts on the promotion and restoration of Indigenous culture and language, Dr Lorna Wanosts’a7 Williams of the University of Victoria, joins the Ahkameyimok Podcast to discuss that ahead of the Symposium on Indigenous Languages hosted by Canadian Heritage on January 25th. 

Indigenous languages represent who we are, expressing the wisdom, our worldview, the laws and lives of our ancestors. But in Canada today, just 1 in 5 First Nations persons is fluent in their language. This reality was born out of generations of colonial suppression of our language and cultures, most notably through the genocide of the residential school system. We want our languages to survive into the next centuries and beyond, and this involves some hard work. There is reason for hope, the numbers of First Nations people taking back their languages is increasing. And last year, Bill C-91, the indigenous languages act, was passed into law. It provides funding and a framework for many approaches to revive indigenous languages. It builds on the hope from our Elders who have worked hard to preserve our languages for us.

One of those Elders is Dr. Lorna Williams of the Lil’wat First Nation. For over fifty years she has been an Indigenous educator and language specialist, working at all levels, from local to national, most recently as the Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Education at the University of Victoria. For her efforts, Dr Williams received the Order of Canada last year.

A big thanks goes out to the Red Dog Singers of Treaty 4 Territory in Saskatchewan for our theme music.

The Ahkameyimok Podcast is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Podcast Productions