Regina chapter activist Jim Elliott (in the back row, second from your left) in this Amnesty International Saskatchewan photo.
The Council of Canadians Regina chapter joined with community members, including Amnesty International Saskatchewan activists, at a Regina city council meeting last night. They were there to support a motion regarding a comprehensive and coordinated national action plan on missing and murdered Indigenous women.
CTV now reports, “Regina city council is adding its voice to calls for a national strategy on murdered and missing aboriginal women. Regina is the latest city to call on Ottawa for a national action plan to deal with violence against women.” Regina joins Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Prince Albert and the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association which have all passed similar resolutions.
In a Facebook post this hour, Regina chapter activist Jim Elliott says, “Good job everybody.”
Indigenous women make up 4.3 per cent of the Canadian population, but they account for 16 per cent of murdered women and 11.3 per cent of missing women in Canada. Over the past 30 years, 1,026 Indigenous women have been murdered and 160 are missing. The Saskatoon Star-Phoenix reports, “Between 1980 and 2012, 153 aboriginal women were murdered in Saskatchewan, compared to 116 non-aboriginal women, according to RCMP. Yet aboriginal women only represent about 15 per cent of the province’s population.” That number has sadly now increased to 159 women.
The Council of Canadians believes an inquiry is needed to understand the root causes of this situation and to develop a national action plan. We have been encouraging our supporters to write letters to the editor, to call their Conservative MP and to get municipal resolutions passed to demand the Harper government take action on a national inquiry by the time of the roundtable meeting on this issue with provincial premiers and Indigenous organizations on February 27 in Ottawa. More on this effort can be found here.
