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Ira McArthur is optimistic about a memorandum of understanding signed this week between his First Nation and the federal government.

If the outcome is as he hopes, it will mean a correction of a 116-year-old dissolution of his Pheasant Rump Nakota and neighbouring Ocean Man First Nations.

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In 1901, the federal government forced three Saskatchewan First Nations to amalgamate: Pheasant Rump Nakota and Ocean Man were subsumed by White Bear and lost all of their land — a rare thing, said Pheasant Rump Chief McArthur.

“There’s very few First Nations across Canada that lost all of their land base,” said McArthur.

In 1986, a settlement agreement between White Bear and the government recognized Ocean Man and Pheasant Rump as new bands, which granted them some land back, but they weren’t viewed or compensated as historic treaty signatories.

Mineral rights weren’t part of the new agreement, said McArthur, and INAC funding was denied for projects and programs due to the land status.