MMIWG inquiry reschedules Nunavut hearing for 2018

Staff from the national inquiry’s Inuit working group meet with Rankin Inlet hamlet officials last August as part of a pre-hearing visit to the Kivalliq community. The national inquiry has now rescheduled its community hearing in Rankin Inlet for Feb. 20, 2018. (FILE PHOTO)

The National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls has rescheduled its community hearing in Rankin Inlet for February 2018, the inquiry announced on Wednesday.

Inquiry staff will host their first official hearing in Nunavut from Feb. 20 to Feb. 22.

The commission originally planned to be in the Kivalliq community earlier this month, but it decided to postpone the hearing due to privacy concerns about Rankin Inlet’s community centre, the venue booked to host the event.

The hearing will run from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. every day, but inquiry staff haven’t yet said where the February hearing will be held. More details are expected to be released in January.

“The public community hearings may also include sharing circle testimonies and artistic expression panels,” the inquiry said in a Dec. 20 news release.

“There will be statement gatherers on site for those who decide to register during the hearing.”

Inquiry staff also postponed November hearings set for Yellowknife, which have now been rescheduled for Jan. 23 to Jan. 25.

The commission is expected to release a full schedule of new community hearing dates in the new year.

While the visit to Rankin Inlet next year will be the inquiry’s first formal hearing in Inuit Nunangat, the inquiry made a couple of last-minute stops in Inuvik, N.W.T., and in Cambridge Bay last week to gather testimony from Inuit in those communities.

Nunavummiut who wish to testify or participate in the Rankin Inlet hearing should contact the inquiry at 1-844-348-4119.

There is Inuktitut-language information on the inquiry on its website.

The inquiry also offers a toll-free support line, which is open 24 hours a day for families and survivors who need support, at 1-844-413-6649.

For those unable to attend the hearing in person, the inquiry will livestream the event from its website and Facebook page.