by Cara McKenna

Snaw-naw-as First Nation is on a mission to get its land back after a railway was built cutting through its reserve north of Nanaimo decades ago.

The nation is suing the owners of the E&N (Esquimalt and Nanaimo) rail line, the Island Corridor Foundation and the Attorney General of Canada asking for about 10 acres of sold land to be given back, plus costs.

The federal Department of Indian Affairs sold E&N the land and gave permission to build on it in the early 1900s — despite the oft-ignored pre-confederation Douglas Treaty that grants Snaw-naw-as land rights. The E&N line was once used as a passenger rail service.

It stopped running in 2011 because of unsafe track conditions. The Island Corridor Foundation responded in February by asking the BC court to throw out the suit, and claims the lands in question are still being used for railway purposes, such as trains running from north Nanaimo to the harbour.

Robert Janes, lawyer for Snaw-naw-as, told the Nanaimo News Bulletin that the owners of the E&N line have yet to prove that they are planning to genuinely run a railway. “The corridor that was taken out of the reserve for the railway was expropriated back in the early part of the 20th century and one of the conditions that goes with any expropriation like that for railways is that once it’s no longer needed or used for railway purposes, it goes back to the original owner,” he said.