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Wilson to start 'sacred work'

Paul Bickford
Northern News Services
Published Wednesday, June 17, 2009

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Three new members - including a well-known NWT resident - have been appointed to a revamped Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Yellowknife's Marie Wilson - best known for her 25 years as a reporter and later regional director with CBC North - was among the commission members named by Indian and Northern Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl on June 10.

"It's absolutely an honour," said Wilson of her appointment. "This is sacred work."

She said residential school survivors will be entrusting the commission with personal stories in the hope that something positive will result.

"We're talking of a lifting of the spirit," she said.

Wilson, who has been appointed to a five-year term, recognizes she and the other commissioners have a "mammoth" task ahead of them.

"I don't think I have any illusions of how big this is going to be," she said.

Wilson will be resigning her current position as vice-president of operations with the Workers' Safety and Compensation Commission of the NWT and Nunavut.

The 59-year-old, who has lived in the North for almost 33 years, said serving on the commission will be good use of her professional and personal experience.

"I live with a residential school survivor," she said, referring to her husband, Stephen Kakfwi, a former premier of the NWT.

Wilson, who is not aboriginal, said her own family has seen the impacts of residential schools and she understands the need to right the ways of the past.

As of July 1, the commission will be chaired by Justice Murray Sinclair, who was the first aboriginal judge in Manitoba.

The third commission member will be Chief Wilton Littlechild of Alberta.

"I am excited that we have three outstanding individuals with passion, vision and commitment who will form a great team and make a rich contribution to the work of this important commission," Strahl said in a statement.

The appointments became necessary after the original members resigned following months of internal bickering.

National Chief Bill Erasmus of the Dene Nation is pleased with the new appointments.

"The people who are chosen are very competent and able to do a good job in our view," Erasmus said.

The national chief was particularly pleased to see Wilson appointed, noting she has been in the North a long time and knows its people.

Erasmus believes the fact Wilson is not aboriginal is not an issue.

Instead, he noted it is good a woman has been named to the commission and Wilson's ability to speak French will help with residential school survivors in Quebec.

The commission has three main objectives - hearing the stories of survivors, preparing records of those stories, and creating activities and events so that the history of residential schools is never forgotten by Canadians.

"We are hoping one of those (events) will happen in the North," Erasmus said of the yet-to-be-determined schedule.

The new members of the commission have been invited to the Dene Nation annual assembly set for July 7 to 9 in Lutsel K'e.

Erasmus said people are anxious to know how to get their voices heard by the commission, which has been tasked to complete its work by 2014.

While the Dene Nation is pleased with the appointments, the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) - a national organization representing Inuit people, including the Inuvialuit of the NWT - is not happy there is not an Inuk on the commission.

"It is our wish and strong desire that an Inuk would have been one of the commissioners," said national Inuit leader Mary Simon in a statement.

The ITK has passed a resolution calling on the new commission to establish an Inuit sub-commission.

In all, about 130,000 children from across Canada were taken from their families and sent to residential schools. They began operating in the 1870s as a joint venture between the federal government and several churches.

Some of the schools operated into the 1990s.

Erasmus noted there were 23 such schools in the NWT and there are as many as 8,000 survivors in the NWT.

In all of Canada, there are an estimated 80,000 survivors.

In an historic apology over the residential school system delivered last year, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the policy of assimilation was wrong and caused great harm.