Ex-official speaks out about alleged racism at Indian Oil and Gas Canada

If Yvette Zentner could turn back time, the career public servant would give her younger self one piece of advice: "Don't apply at IOGC."

That's a reference to Indian Oil and Gas Canada, an Alberta-based federal agency that oversees fossil fuel development on First Nations lands. It's been roiled in recent years by reports of "staggering" racism and a toxic work environment.

But Zentner, a member of the Siksika Nation east of Calgary, did apply at IOCG and spent 27 years with the agency. She's suing her former employer as one of two lead plaintiffs in a proposed class-action lawsuit, first filed in 2021.

The lawsuit's claims of systemic discrimination are unproven and being tested through a process known as certification. The federal government rejects the case and wants it dismissed entirely on jurisdictional grounds.

"As far as IOGC goes, it wasn't a good experience for me," Zentner said in an interview from her home in Okotoks, Alta.

After retiring in May, Zenter is sharing her story of unrealized ambitions and crushed hopes publicly — a story lawyers put forward as emblematic of Indigenous staffers' experience at IOGC.

"I thought this was going to be a really good job opportunity for me," she recalled.

"But I soon found out that wasn't going to be that easy. I encountered racism, systemic racism, the first day that I was there."

She describes being arbitrarily denied training, suffering persistent harassment by a superior — her court affidavit says they were found guilty of doing so by outside investigators in 2015 — and eventually giving up hope altogether.

"I was just pigeonholed there for almost 18 years," she said.

"I think opportunities would have come easily if I wasn't Indigenous, and possibly if I wasn't a woman."

She is joined in the case by others who say they also entered the bureaucracy eager for change only to find the environment discriminatory and harmful.

"There were so many times where I drove home crying, where I just wanted to quit," said Zentner.

"But I couldn't and I didn't, so I stuck it out. And the day I was entitled to my full pension, I got out of there."