Ahousaht First Nation - Elected System

Elected System

In addition to the governing body through the Hawiih, Ahousaht has a mandated body of elected officials. This is the Ahousaht Chief and Council. The number of councillors is determined by the overall size of the population. For every 100 members of a nation, there is to be elected one council member, to a maximum of 12 members (as per the Indian act.). Elected Council’s role is to be accountable to this Indian Act. Overall, both Ha’wiih and Chief and Council are ultimately there to represent the Ahousaht membership and honour our long history. Ahousaht’s first Council was appointed by the Ha’wiih rather than elected by the membership, sometime in the early 1950s. The late Paul Sam, (Stanley Sam’s father), was the first Chief Councillor. We eventually went to the elected system, as dictated by the Indian Act. Coincidentally or not, it has since been down hill in many ways — economically, socially and culturally, as we struggle with two systems of governance. Work has been done to bridge the gap between the two systems by both the elected and the hereditary leaders, with both sides quite interested in supporting and supplementing each others goals and objectives.

The Councillors and our Chief Councillor were usually elected on two-year terms; however, due to a court decision (Courbier decision) this has caused changes to be made, and Ahousaht are adopting a new process for holding elections. One significant change will be the change from two to four year terms for council to sit. Another important change is the inclusion of all members of the nation in the voting process. Previously, only those living 'on-reserve'(I.R15 - Marktosis reserve) were allowed to participate in this voting process. Council is responsible for appointments to other boards on behalf of the Ha’wiih.