Confrontation between Nipissing First Nation fishermen and the MNRF conflicts with Chief's promise. (VIDEO)

The unrest surrounding the state of the walleye fishery in Lake Nipissing appears to be heating up.

A new video posted to Facebook captures a confrontation between Nipissing First Nation fishermen using gillnets and officers with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry.

The video was posted by Rodney Commanda on Saturday September 10th and involves three fishermen and three officers, one being a NFN natural resources representative.

"MNR with NFN Natural Resource representative attempting to interfere with NFN members treaty-protected right to fish," Commanda writes.

"This is an attempt to infringe on inherent rights of cultural and hereditary significance so as to cripple our way of life. This would subject all First Nation's to ever higher levels of government control. This confrontation took place on Lake Nipissing near Garden Village at around 7:30am September 10, 2016. They were unsuccessful at confiscating our nets as well as our catch. We asked them to meet us at our community dock to engage further actions and they declined after taking our picture. They then moved on to patrolling the lake."

View the video here.

The video comes well after NFN Chief Scott McLeod said in a news release that NFN closed its commercial fishery for the season on August 31, 2016, to remain within the recommended safe harvest level. 

"Given the state of the fishery and our efforts to do our part to conserve walleye in Lake Nipissing, we are calling on everyone to make a short term sacrifice for the long term good of the lake,” said Chief McLeod in calling for a suspension of the winter recreational fishing season.

See that story here: Close down winter walleye fishery says Nipissing first Nation

The Lake Nipissing Stakeholders Association, in response to the video told BayToday: "While we commend Chief McLeod for his decision to close the commercial fishery, it is apparent that not all band members will be abiding by the closure. The following video was shot on September 10th of this year by a first nations member commercially fishing 10 days after the closed season while enforcement tries to stop them. It seems that the MOU agreement and enforcement have no teeth. This pair will probably harvest more walleye in one week what the entire commercial ice fishing community, abiding by current regulations, will harvest over the 10 weeks of the ice fishing season."

See related story: Stakeholders fear ice fishing will disappear on Lake Nipissing