Nuchatlaht First Nation: How a Legal Battle Could Change Land Rights for Good

The Ktunaxa Nation lost its battle to protect sacred lands from development.

The Ktunaxa Nation typically does not disclose information about its sacred practices, but in the Indigenous tribe’s battle for rights to land in an area called Qat’muk, it provided crucial background about the spiritual significance of the snowy mountainsides where it believes the Grizzly Bear Spirit dances. The Nation crafted the Qat’muk Declaration, which argued for protecting the land against being developed as the Jumbo Glacier Resort, and delivered it to government land managers in Victoria in 2010. 

Tribal arguments notwithstanding, British Columbia’s provincial government approved the resort in 2012. The Ktunaxa appealed for judicial review to the provincial supreme court and later to the BC Court of Appeal and the Canadian Supreme Court, arguing the resort would “cause the Grizzly Bear Spirit to leave,” ruining the spirituality of the sacred land. In 2017, the Canadian Supreme Court dismissed the Ktunaxa’s case, ruling that BC’s government had dispersed “Crown land” appropriately.

The Ktunaxa waged their battle against a backdrop...