Ottawa won’t add Inuk MMIWG commissioner, Bennett says

INAC minister Carolyn Bennett speaks to board members at Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami’s annual general meeting in Kuujjuaq Sept. 14. That’s where Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. president Cathy Towtongie asked the minister to add a sixth, Inuk commissioner to oversee the inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. (PHOTO BY SARAH ROGERS)

KUUJJUAQ—The federal government won’t budge on the question of appointing an Inuk commissioner to the inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, the minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs said in Kuujjuaq Sept. 14.

The launch of the five-member commission, announced last month, spurred calls from some Inuit and other Indigenous people that the government add a sixth, Inuk commissioner to the inquiry.

Cathy Towtongie, the president of Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., made that request directly to INAC Minister Carolyn Bennett at this week’s meeting of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami meeting in Kuujjuaq Sept. 14.

Bennett didn’t respond directly to Towtongie’s request, but later told Nunatsiaq News that inquiry is set to go, as is.

“The commission is the commission,” Bennett said, adding that there would be an opportunity for Inuit to work with the inquiry.

First Nations judge Marion Buller was named to chair the inquiry, with the help of four commissioners: former Quebec Native Women’s Association president Michèle Audette, Saskatchewan Métis lawyer Marilyn Poitras, Ontario First Nations lawyer Brian Eyolfson and Nunavut-raised lawyer Qajaq Robinson.

Robinson grew up in Nunavut and speaks fluent Inuktitut, but the fact that she is not Inuk has remained a sticking point for many.

“This is an Indigenous inquiry into Indigenous issues,” said Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada president Rebecca Kudloo last month. “And we feel like only an Indigenous person knows what we’ve been through.”

None of the groups that have called publicly for an Inuk commissioner said they were approached for suggestions.

In the absence of an Inuk commissioner, ITK’s pre-consultation report called for an Inuit Elders Advisory Committee and a Families Advisory Committee to serve the inquiry’s commissioners.

Bennett said it was through Pauktuutit that she first encountered Robinson, who was hired to work on the pre-inquiry consultations, and noted how well Robinson worked with families during that process and how much she was respected.

Inuit organizations have pushed for a “distinctions based approach” to the inquiry, meaning that parts of the inquiry would be Inuit-specific, rather than use a pan-Aboriginal approach.

During the same ITK meeting, Pauktuutit’s Kudloo also asked Bennett to ensure counselling and Inuktitut-language support is available to Inuit families involved in the inquiry, before, during and after the process.

Bennett agreed.

“We’ll be looking for your help in deciding what that counselling should look like,” Bennett said.

“It’s a concern for all of us. Even for the people who don’t testify [because] the issue is new and raw again.”

The commission’s mandate is to examine and then report on the systemic causes behind the violence that Indigenous women and girls have experienced, while looking at the underlying factors that explain that higher level of violence.

The federal government has budgeted $53.86 million for the two-year inquiry, which is expected to wrap up by the end of 2018.