Nickel Belt News Volume 60 • Issue 42
Friday, October 16, 2020
Thompson, Manitoba
Serving the Norman Region since 1961
Preventing Indigenous women from being murdered, going missing requires commitment from everyone, say vigil speakers
BY IAN GRAHAM
EDITOR@THOMPSONCITIZEN.NET
People with family members who’ve been murdered or gone missing shared some of the effects that those losses had on them during a memorial walk and candlelight vigil in Thompson Oct. 4. Held to mark the provincial day of awareness and national day of remembrance for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls (MMIWG), the walk began at the office of Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO), which organized the event, and ended at MacLean Park in front of City Hall. “I lost my mom Linda Bighetty when I was very young,” said Jenny Lay, who works as a project and event co-ordinator with MKO’s MMIWG liaison unit. “She was murdered and because of that I grew up in a lot of systems that failed me. The systems that we have in place right now, they don’t help, they don’t make things easier for me or people like me.” “There needs to be better mechanisms for those children left behind not to end up in a system or involved in a lifetime of institutions, whether it’s the child welfare system, hospitals, prisons,” said MMIWG liaison unit manager Hilda Anderson-Pyrz. “That happens a
Thompson Citizen photos by Ian Graham An event to mark the provincial day of awareness and national day of remembrance for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in Thompson Oct. 4 included a memorial walk, candlelight vigil, and drumming, dancing and singing performances. lot if we’re not giving those young children the tools and the supports that they need when they lose a mother to homicide or if their mother goes missing. We need to ensure that those children are properly cared for.” Felicia Lobster, who led the walk and performed an honour song at the outset
of the MacLean Park ceremony and a jingle dress dance at the end of it, has also been impacted by violence against Indigenous woman. “I lost my older sister to murder a couple years back, 2011,” said Lobster. “It’s almost been 10 years now. I always remember her in
spirit every time I dance.” The impacts of someone being murdered or going missing extend beyond immediate family, said Thompson Mayor Colleen Smook, remembering when George and Melinda Wood came to her snowmobile shop many years ago with their young daughter Chris-
tine Wood, who was killed in Winnipeg at the age of 21 in 2016. “When I first heard she was missing, it was definitely a true family member and sometimes they say it takes someone really close to you to totally appreciate that it’s not just one family, it’s not just your family that
this happens to,” said the mayor. The issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women was first brought to attention by women themselves, said MKO Grand Chief Garrison Settee, but it is not a women’s issue. “Women were crying out, something needed to be done for our sisters and I asked myself where are the warriors in this picture?” said Settee, remembering a resolution regarding MMIWG he and Perry Bellegarde, now Assembly of First Nations (AFN) national chief, passed at an AFN assembly back when Settee was chief of Pimicikamak Cree Nation. “Where are the chiefs in that picture? I apologized to all our sisters in that assembly. I said we have failed you by not being the warriors we’re supposed to be.” Without everyone working toward a future in which Indigenous women and girls are no longer much more likely to go missing and be murdered than Canadian women as a whole, the problem can’t be solved, said Lay. “Everyone needs to make a commitment because that’s what a pathway for change is,” she said. “If not every person changes the way their heart feels things or sees things, then it’s never going to change.”
Family that contracted COVID-19 now considered recovered, says York Factory First Nation York Factory First Nation (YFFN) said Oct. 7 that all the members of a family in York Landing who contracted COVID-19 after one of them went to Winnipeg for a medical appointment are now considered recovered. The cases were still listed as active on the provincial government’s COVID-19 website, which updates statistics daily, as of Oct. 14. YFFN members who were in close contact with members of the family that tested positive have been tested and all tests that were analyzed at Cadham Provincial Laboratory have come back negative, the First Nation said. Eleven
people’s tests were cancelled due to leakage but YFFN said some have opted to be retested while others are choosing to voluntarily self-monitor for symptoms and self-isolate for 14 days instead. The 14-day self-isolation for most close contacts of the people who tested positive was due to end Oct. 8 and no one from that list of close contacts has called in with symptoms, though some have been instructed to self-isolate longer. The family that tested positive has completed the required self-isolation period but plans to stay home for another week. A lockdown continues in
York Landing, with all residents instructed to stay home as much as possible. Masks are mandatory in public places and people are required to maintain social distancing of two metres from people
outside their household. Only one person per household is allowed to go out to pick up essentials. All social gathering remain forbidden and visitors, apart from essential workers may not enter the community. The ferry to York Landing began operating again Oct. 8 for people who have been stranded away from home, either in our outside of York Landing, and regular service began Oct. 9 and continues until Oct. 23 for essential travel only. Essential travel to Thompson is allowed and people who return in three days or less do not have to self-isolate but should limit
contact with other people after returning and monitor themselves for symptoms and notify the nursing station if any develop. People who are out of the community for more than three days must self-isolate at the community’s hotel or in their home with their entire household for 14 days upon returning. Travel to Winnipeg is limited to urgent medical appointments only and anyone returning from Winnipeg must self-isolate and self-monitor for symptoms for 14 days. If they choose to self-isolate at home, all other members of the household must self-isolate as well.