The federal government has launched their Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women inquiry on Aug. 3, featuring five prominent indigenous members from across the country heading the inquiry.
When it comes to political action, the widely researched and contested issue has seen flip flopping from the Harper Conservatives, but has been well received by Trudeau’s federal government, with the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Inquiry high on his list of 2015 campaign promises.
This issues goes beyond individual cases but a problem that goes way deeper.
So let us lay out the facts.
Indigenous people make up 4.3 per cent of the 2011 Canadian population with 1,400,685 people identifying as Aboriginal.
Within the total population Saskatchewan, we are looking at 15.6 per cent identifying as aboriginal.
Breaking that down, 718,500 were female and represent 4.3 per cent of total 2011 female Canadian population.
So we are looking at a fraction of the Canadian population and yet Aboriginal women are far more likely to be murdered within Canada, between 3.5 and 4 times more likely for aboriginal women over the age of 15.
The most common number noted is a staggering 1,017 murdered aboriginal women between 1980 to 2012, according to Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women: A National Overview, an RCMP-led study.
Looking at the crime statistics, this represents 16 per cent of female homicides in Canada.
Regionally, the numbers look different.
In Saskatchewan, 55 per cent of female homicides were women who identified as Aboriginal. In Manitoba, this number is 49 per cent within a province who has the city with the highest population of Aboriginal people.
This percentage is not even counting the numerous missing cases of Aboriginal women.
As of the end of 2013, there were 164 aboriginal women reported missing, accounting for 11.3 per cent of all reported missing female cases.
Aboriginal issues within Canada are too complex to speculate on so the inquiry commission has their work cut out for them.
According to Amnesty International’s Stolen Sister Report released in 2004, the noted many racist and sexist motives behind the treatment of specific cases and a lack of support from law enforcement for victims and their families.
Historically, we have a blatant history of ignorance and poor treatment of aboriginal people and looking at how racism thrives in Saskatchewan, towards both aboriginal men and women, it is no wonder that missing and murdered aboriginal women have been the result of this.
I do not think that we can narrow the root cause of violence towards aboriginal women down to one sole cause.
It is a wide reaching problem that both originates and causes many issues within Canadian society.
Everyone seems to have an opinion on both missing murdered indigenous women or aboriginal people in general but this is not an issue that can be solved easily or quickly
Acknowledging the problem or our own rolls within it is the first step to solving it.
Will the inquiry lead to solutions?
One can only hope.
A CBC missing and murdered indigenous women database (http://www.cbc.ca/missingandmurdered/) notes 40 missing and murdered aboriginal women in Saskatchewan but considering they only have 258 cases within their database out of a total 1,175 cases, I am sure there are more.
As a reporter, the best thing I can do to help these women is make their names known.
Some of these are still unsolved.
Beatrice Adam
36, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Bernadine Quewezance
36, SK, Murdered
Brandy Wesaquate
29, SK, Missing
Brooklyn Moose
25, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Carol Prudhomme
46, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Caroline Burns
52, SK, Missing
Corrine Moosomin
25, SK, Missing
Danita Bigeagle
22, SK, Missing
Dawn Keewatin
17, SK, Murdered
Debbie Pelletier
27, SK, Murdered
Delores Whiteman
40, SK, Missing
Donna Kasyon
20, SK, Murdered
Edna Smith
24, SK, Missing
Unresolved
Emily Osmond
78, SK, Missing
Ernestine Kasyon
26, SK, Missing
Heather Ballantyne
40, SK, Murdered
Janet Sylvestre
38, SK, Murdered
Janine Wesaquate
20, SK, Murdered
Jean Moccasin
N/A, SK, Murdered
Jeannette Chief
49, SK, Murdered
Joyce Tillotson
42, SK, Missing
Karina Wolfe
20, SK, Murdered
Solved
Kelly Goforth
21, SK, Murdered
Lavina Tocher
35, SK, Missing
Maggie Natomagan
74, SK, Missing
Margaret Blackbird
21, SK, Missing
Marie Lasas
19, SK, Murdered
Marie Mike
22, SK, Missing
Mary Goodfellow
67, SK, Missing
Maxine Wapass
23, SK, Murdered
Melanie Geddes
24, SK, Murdered
Myrna Montgrand
14, SK, Missing
Nadine Machiskinic
29, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Naomi Desjarlais
21, SK, Murdered
Patricia Favel
18, SK, Missing
Rhonda Gardiner
33, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Richele Bear
22, SK, Missing
Sharon Merasty
18, SK, Murdered
Unresolved
Shirley Lonethunder
25, SK, Missing
Tamra Keepness
5, SK, Missing
