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Two months after discovering that their chief collected an $800,000 bonus for signing away 236 hectares of land — effectively making him the highest paid elected official in Canada — members of the Vancouver-area Kwikwetlem First Nation are suing to have the deal overturned.

“I’m not against the chief, I’m against what he did,” said Kwikwetlem member Ron Jackman, the main plaintiff in the suit.

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In July, documents made public by the First Nations Financial Transparency Act revealed that Kwikwetlem Chief Ron Giesbrecht made $914,219 tax free for the 2013/2014 fiscal year.

Most of Chief Giesbrecht’s income was due to him receiving a 10% cut of an $8-million payment made by the Province of British Columbia.

The members of the Kwikwetlem First Nation have never consented to the extinguishment of our Aboriginal Title

Although the band initially claimed the money was for “economic development contracts,” an investigation by the National Post confirmed in August that the money was paid to have the Kwikwetlem “extinguish” claims to a neighbouring parcel of Crown land being liquidated by the provincial government.