The Akhameyimok Podcast: What Brings You Hope?
As National Chief, Perry Bellegarde always focused on the importance hope: "Always leave more hope in a room than was there when you arrived."
Over the 50+ episodes 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?
As his time as National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations comes to an end, after choosing not to seek re-election, we are looking back at some of his favorite answers to that question about hope.
They are inspiring, thought provoking and speak to a better future for First Nations.
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. For more on the work of the Assembly of First Nations, visit AFN.ca
