Make inquiry relevant now – The Chronicle Journal

May 17, 2017

Advocates for the long-awaited inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women openly worried this week that plans for the initiative are “in serious trouble.” · But even if the road to the inquiry’s launch is rocky, issues likely to be highlighted by it are already well-known by those who can help change women’s lives for the better right now, particularly the federal government.

Last week Sheila North Wilson, a grand chief of a Manitoba First Nations agency, told The Canadian Press the following: “The biggest need, immediately, that I see, is to provide better resources and opportunities for our women and girls and families.” Note she said immediately, not two or five years from now.

These days, leaders like Wilson rightly talk about the need to “empower” indigenous girls and young women, so that they won’t end up in abusive relationships, or fall victim to shopping-mall traffickers who recruit them and force them into prostitution.

Read More: http://www.chroniclejournal.com/opinion/editorials/make-inquiry-relevant-now/article_f6798bee-3af6-11e7-91ef-1fef82732633.html