Supporters of Henry Felix say they are unhappy with a recent federal court ruling regarding the 2013 Sturgeon Lake First Nation election.
Felix won the election for chief but was disqualified by the electoral officer who said he owed money to the band.
Craig Bighead was elected chief in a subsequent by-election.
In a ruling last month, Justice Catherine Kane found the election appeal tribunal did not give Felix a fair hearing and should hear his case again.
Gertrude Felix, a member of the working group who brought the court case forward, says the judge should have went further and declared Henry Felix as chief.
“We were sorry that Judge Kane didn’t automatically rectify that Henry Felix was our chief,” she says. “That decision could have been hers, instead it went back just like throwing us back to the dogs.”
Gary Wichihin adds they have little faith they will receive an unbiased hearing from the appeal tribunal this time around.
“The appeal tribunal is one-sided right from the beginning of the three leaderships,” he says. “It’s always been one-sided. They handpicked this because they bring their people in because they’ve got the money to bring the people in and we don’t have that kind of money.”
A. J. Felix says the working group feels like it is back where it started.
“When corruption is vibrant and you know it’s there and you’ve seen it and you’ve even proved it in court, throw the ball back into the corruption camp,” he says. To us, it’s of kind of leaving us in the precarious situation.”
In her ruling, Justice Kane also says the appeal tribunal was biased as it participated in the disqualification of Felix’s candidacy.