‘NOT FAMILIES FIRST’
Danielle Ewenin, shown with granddaughter Constance Woodward, 6, says testifying before the inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls was made more difficult because the commission did not provide a supportive environment.
One of the women who testified before the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in Saskatoon this week says she hopes inquiry staff listen to feedback and create a more welcoming environment for survivors and families at future community hearings.
Danielle Ewenin travelled to Saskatoon from the Kawacatoose First Nation this week to tell inquiry commissioners how her family has coped since her sister, Eleanor “Laney” Ewenin, was found dead on the outskirts of Calgary in 1982. No one has ever been charged in connection with her death.
Ewenin said she has heard from families who struggled to get the inquiry to reimburse them for travel and hotel costs.
“People have felt humiliated, felt embarrassed, having to ask three, four times for their travel and been told to wait even though they need it desperately. They have children with them and they don’t have any money,” she said. “That is not families first. That is not treating them with dignity and that’s not showing respect to the families. They’re treating these families like every other institution in the system and compounding the shame.”
She’s heard from people who reached out to the inquiry earlier in the year, but were not scheduled to present in Saskatoon hearings, and she knows people who wanted to share their stories in public, but were asked to testify in private rooms, she said.
National Inquiry Chief Commissioner Marion Buller told media repeatedly this week that the inquiry is “focused on the families.” On Thursday she said everyone who had wanted to testify in public was able to do so. She said earlier this week that families struggling with travel should contact the inquiry.
Ewenin said if the inquiry had reached out more to communities before coming to Saskatoon, many groups could have provided support.
May Henderson, acting director of the Saskatoon Indian and Metis Friendship Centre, said the centre wanted to offer aftercare support, but worried it would have to cancel planned programs because the inquiry didn’t come through with funding until very late. It was late on Nov. 17 when the inquiry confirmed the centre would receive $17,000 to offer aftercare. Hearings began Nov. 21.
Free shuttles took people between the Friendship Centre and the hotel where the hearings were held. Henderson said about 50 people came to the centre on the first day, but the numbers tapered off later and were below what she expected.
More hearings are scheduled in Maliotenam, Que. next week and in Thunder Bay, Ont. the week of Dec. 4. The inquiry announced this week that hearings scheduled in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut in mid-December will be rescheduled.
They’re treating these families like every other institution in the system and compounding the shame.