Letters: Deceiving the Diné people

What Richie Nez ought to be feeling is shame for deceiving the Diné people. Or is the “huge weight of responsibility” Ben Shelly’s fault? Either way, the appointment of Nez without State Bar membership was a decision based on mutually known information that was against the law. How many people were hurt by wrongful judgment with misinterpretation and misapplications of policy and law?

And now the Supreme Court acts to sweep all this under the rug. This is also wrong. All this is enough for the U.S. attorney general to step in and investigate for corruption, conspiracy, and racketeering.

Just five years ago the Shirley/Shelly administration divorced. However, Shelly hired Nez and Shirley appointed Chief Justice Herb Yazzie.

Yazzie’s Supreme Court ruling to have Shirley sit out one term was probably also a conspiracy. These actions show that job qualifications, education, and ethics mean nothing to the Navajo Nation.

Everyone knows a majority of the Navajo Nation’s top management do not have college degrees. Making sure education job qualifications and ethics are met are the personnel director’s responsibility, and for this failure he should be terminated or resign as many Diné university and military degreed individuals are trying to get Navajo Nation jobs.

By now the minimum qualifications for all high level Navajo Nation jobs, council delegates, and the president ought to be a four-year college degree plus the ability to speak Navajo fluently. There is no justice!

That is why Russell Begaye overstepped Navajo Nation sovereignty and filed a complaint in federal court. So does that mean a coalition of petitioners that were wrongfully judged by Nez can file a civil rights class action lawsuit against the Navajo Nation in federal court?

Over the years Diné have witnessed Navajo Nation council delegates brought up on embezzlement charges, there has been Shirley’s BCDI/ONSAT scandal and Russell Begaye and Maryboy’s Oil & Gas fiasco, chapter officials stealing chapter monies, and tribal employees getting away with purchase (P) card abuse. Why do we continue to complain of living under this dark shroud of corruption?

With K’e, nothing is done except maybe a slap on the wrist. What will happen is the Republican controlled Congress will find what Navajo Nation is doing and drastically cut funding.

What is funded will keep Navajo Nation bureaucrats high on the hog while the outback people suffer even more. Currently with all this unqualified personnel there is no intelligent and meaningful progress to lead our Diné out of poverty, 90 percent goes to administration and barely 10 percent goes to service delivery.
The bureaucrats get fatter and blatantly nastier while our Diné poor fall further behind in important areas of their lives and into poverty.

The $410 million dollars should go directly to the Diné people, excluding Navajo Nation, BIA, BIE funded schools, and IHS funded organization employees as it is on behalf of these hogan level census numbers these folks work. Proposed funding to roads, health and human services, public/capital improvement, infrastructure, housing, and economic development is ridiculous. What’s been going on all these years with all the millions of dollars in funding?

Qualified educated leaders in these areas would not cry for funding, they would have had the job done. I can see funding to law and order (white collar crime units) and scholarships.

The public hearings are a scam because only a few attendees decide for a huge majority that was not able to be there. The right thing to do is send an official, time sensitive, pre-paid postage ballot-like document to every Diné with a census number to get meaningful input on the use of $410 million dollars to bring our Diné out of poverty and into a 5th glittering world where strong justice righteous rules and where Diné rights are protected.

Am I just “feeling kind of giddy” or is it the spirit of the Yei Mask?

Hosteen Badonie Jr.
Chinle, Ariz.

Navajo government is unstable, tarnished with incompetence

The recent agreement between attorneys for the Navajo Nation Department of Justice and the Navajo Nation Council to keep President Shelly in office until the election of a Navajo president identifies as its primary issue the “stability of Navajo government,” and to “maintain [Navajo government] structure and integrity.”

The attorneys are in error by presuming the Navajo Nation government is stable, and has structure and integrity. The unpleasant reality is that our government is unstable, and its structure and integrity is comprised as a result of the political role that the Navajo Nation Supreme Court has taken.

Throughout this ongoing political crisis, the legitimacy of the Navajo Nation Supreme Court is called into question.

Navajo legal observers have noted that the Navajo Supreme Court’s decision requiring the selective application of a Navajo fluency test to determine Navajo presidential candidacy violated the Navajo Nation Bill of Rights’ equal protection and due process provisions by singling out Mr. Deschene while not requiring other candidates to take a Navajo fluency test.

Still yet, these same observers noted the weak standing of the court’s decision. Equally damaging to the Navajo judiciary’s legitimacy is the revelation that Mr. Ritchie Nez, the former chief hearing officer for the Navajo Nation Office of Hearing and Appeals, did not have the required licenses to practice law or to render decisions effecting the rights of countless Navajo people who sought a redress of their grievance before the Office of Hearing and Appeals.

It is hard to believe that the Supreme Court did not know that Mr. Nez was unqualified to be the chief hearing officer of an important tribal judicial entity.

One professional observer of the Navajo judiciary noted that because of the political nature of the appeal, the case could have been the Navajo Supreme Court’s “Marbury v. Madison,” an opportunity to explore the Political Question Doctrine, deciding whether the issue was non-justiciable.

In other words, whether the court lacked manageable standards for resolving the inherently political conflict; whether it was beyond the discretion of the court to decide; leaving the controversy to be addressed by other branches of government; or to simply recognize the will of the people to decide the controversy by the power of the vote. Allow the people to decide whether their president should be more proficient in Navajo, English, or both.

Despite these troubling observations, it is clear Chief Justice Herb Yazzie missed an opportunity, through legal dicta, to explore and condemn the impact of assimilative federal Indian law and policies on Navajo people, language, and ways of living, while also acknowledging the changing cultural dynamics of Navajo people well into the 21st century, an age of lightning fast Internet connections of hundreds of millions of people, powerful social media, the development of medical miracles, and exploration into the deepest parts of the ocean and the universe.

Without the thorough analysis of applicable case-law, codified and fundamental Navajo law, and the changing cultural and educational dynamics of Navajo people, Chief Justice Yazzie denied thousands of Navajo people an opportunity to serve the Navajo Nation, bringing with them their advanced degrees, professional experience, and desire to return the Navajo Nation to greatness.

It was not too long ago that the Navajo judiciary was seen nationally, among tribal courts and law schools, for its sophistication in its development and application of tribal jurisprudence, and for weaving principles of Navajo fundamental law into decisions in an effort to assist in re-establishing the Navajo people’s central religious-philosophical goal in life: Hozho.

Today, the image of the Navajo Nation’s highest court is tarnished with politics, and many argue, incompetence.

Irma Bluehouse
Milton Bluehouse Jr.
Ganado, Ariz.

Introduce 4th branch the security of the Diné people

A “coup” is an illegal seizure of power from a government. That is what we are witnessing with Council Delegate Leonard Tsosie and those delegates, and Ben Shelly who have joined him.

Our government has never been the people’s government. The first council in 1924, was put together by the BIA to serve outside interests — the oil and gas companies. The council met once, voted to hand over their authority to a white official from Washington, and disbanded. That changed 10 years later, but the pattern was set and has never really changed.

Ever since the 1920s our government has served the outside interests and the thievery interests of elected leaders. It is as rampant today as ever.

Also, for almost a century our economic decisions have been controlled by lawyers for the nation, the corporations, and outside political interests. But we still have 50 percent and more unemployment. That’s because the lawyers are letting others steal from us our economic and political wealth. If you want to see it, drive to Phoenix. Our wealth has made and is still making that city prosper.

Leonard Tsosie started his latest hijinks by trying to get Chris Deschene into the presidency, but Mr. Deschene is disqualified from running. That was ultimately Mr. Deschene’s doing.

He did not think his campaign through for obvious issues like that. He could have handled it better from the very beginning when he filed for candidacy. And after the difficulty started he handled it badly; he and his lawyer even failed on a rookie lawyer technicality when they appealed to the Supreme Court. I wish they hadn’t.

But these are all side issues. Mr. Tsosie has complained about Mr. Deschene’s 9,000-plus voters being disenfranchised and not having due process. But, Mr. Deschene got due process, and denied himself some of it. About twice as many voters, somewhere around 18,000 casted their votes for Joe Shirley and Russell Begaye.

Obviously Mr. Tsosie and the other delegates, and Ben Shelly do not really care for all voters’ rights or due process. They care for their own agendas — enough so they have made a coup attempt to take over the government.

Let’s look at the legal landscape.

1. Ben Shelly vetoed the proposed change in the fluency law. So, Mr. Deschene is out.

2. The Supreme Court, as is precedent for all courts, has said all applicable rulings from Navajo tribunals point remain valid. So Mr. Deschene is still out, and the election is supposed to happen by the end of January. Those responsible for doing this, the president, the delegates, and the election office have twiddled their thumbs. This is contempt, and an affront to the people.

3. The so-called pardon legislation has no legal basis. The nation has no pardon statute. Also, pardons arise in criminal matters. There are no criminal matters involved. And, pardons are done by presidents and governors.

4. Wiping out the primary election results is illegal. Again, Mr. Deschene received 9,000-plus votes, but he also got due process and was disqualified after that. Joe Shirley and Russell Begaye together received about 18,000 votes, but they are not disqualified. So, their votes have a lawful and vested interest in this election that Mr. Tsosie and the others just took away. There is no due process in this or any legal authority.

They just took over the government and government process, and are joined by a typically confused Ben Shelly. Mr. Tsosie and his followers have now illegally disenfranchised almost 20,000 voters. And they have illegally violated Mr. Shirley’s and Mr. Begay’s rights of due process. Mr. Tsosie so often talks about protecting people’s rights of due process, but he’s obviously selective about it. Only the rights of those he wants protected will he stand up for.

5. This so-called “agreement” between Ben Shelly and Speaker LoRenzo Bates to make Ben Shelly president, signed Jan. 9 by them and, you guessed it, Leonard Tsosie, plus by two future delegates with no authority to sign anything is not legal. These few people cannot bind the council.

Also, the agreement says the president and the council had nothing to do with the election fiasco. Of course they did. The council passed the law on fluency and left out a definition, creating havoc. The council has oversight responsibility for the Board of Election Supervisors, which failed to insure all applicants were qualified. The president was a candidate. He had a duty to challenge anyone in the race he felt was not lawfully in it. Also, the agreement cites no legal authority for its existence. That’s because there is none.

They say they want to maintain the structure and integrity of the government. By pulling all these stunts with Mr. Tsosie and the others, they have carried out a foolish coup of our government and made an additional mockery of our Navajo Nation. Somebody has to move in now and clean up this additional mess. The only arm of the government left for this is the courts and to introduce the 4th branch the security of the Diné people.

Ed Becenti
Diné Grassroots Liaison
Window Rock, Ariz.

Founding SWJRA

Ya’ah’teeh to all my relations on Navajo land. My name is Justin Yazzie and I am from White Cone, Ariz., originally from Tsin-nan-tee area. I am T—tsohnii (Big Water Clan), born for Tsi’naajinii (Black Streak Wood People Clan). My grandmothers are Kiyaa’aanii (Towering House) and N‡t’oh diné’é T‡chii’nii (Red Running Into the Water People).

The South West Junior Rodeo Association was founded back in 2009. My children, Sherayle Yazzie and Smiley Wylie Yazzie, approached me on a sunny day in early 2009 and asked me if I could do something for the youth within the area.

They wanted to join a junior rodeo association but it was too far to travel to the Indian Junior Rodeo Association and Western Junior Rodeo Association junior rodeos, so I started putting the legal documentations together and sat down with my family.

Seehee Morris Jr. did a little ceremony for SWJRA to become a reality for the youth. From there I started going around to families that had youth in junior rodeos and they really wanted SWJRA to come alive. I had a lot of help from Viadel Nelson and Benson Kee.

I had a lot of community meetings at the new White Cone High School, as well as White Cone Chapter House for families and youth to add input and ideas on how they wanted SWJRA to go. Through them we put board members together and SWJRA was born.

First, we put the foundation together along with by-laws, regulations, rules, and later became certified as a 501c3 non-profit organization. It took a lot of work, time and traveling, but I am really thankful my aunts, Velma Robertson, Sheila Barton and Thomasina Long, were there to get all the main documentations together.
As SWJRA was well on its way, families wanted to sponsor rodeos as soon as possible, so the board agreed and started having junior rodeos.

The first year we had close to 80 contestants. Today, SWJRA has nearly 140 contestants and still growing. SWJRA is not limited to Native American alone, it’s open to the world. Any nationality can join SWJRA and we’re trying to expand to border towns.

SWJRA is for the youth between the ages 4 to 18 with 90 percent payback to the youth. This was recommended by my chei, Lowva Kinlicheenie. Our contestants win earnings and they are really proud of it. This year will be our sixth year and anyone that wants to sponsor or join SWJRA are welcome.

Our logo also was printed with my idea. The horseshoe represents the donkey hoof, which in Diné teachings represents “I’na” (life), head of all livestock. The feather represents health. As with all our traditional ceremonies the eagle feather is mostly used to pray to our creator. Then the buckle on top represents good materialistic prizes, money, saddle, and trailers. The SWJRA inside the horseshoe is made into a boot design, which represents the contestants.

I would like to thank the following for their support, efforts and prayers for putting SWJRA on its foot: Seehee Morris and Virda Yazzie, Kenny and Shelby Long, Viadel and Velma Nelson, Julian Todacheenie and family, Lowva Kinlicheenie and family, Benson Kee and family, Thomasina Long and family, Penny and Debbie Robbins, Hank and Della Robertson, Roxanne Robertson, Ernest Begay, Sheila Barton, and all those that came to nabikiyaté (planning) meetings.

For more information or to sponsor a rodeo, visit www.swjra.webs.com.

Justin Yazzie
White Cone, Ariz.