Chesterfield Inlet woman gets chance to bend PM’s ear

Updated Aug. 5 at 9:37 a.m.

Sarah Mazhero noticed a problem when she returned to Chesterfield Inlet in 2016 after living in Montreal for nine years. The flour that was relatively cheap in Montreal was $20 in her childhood community.

“This is not OK,” she said of the memory.

Limited access to food in the hamlet of Chesterfield Inlet, where Mazhero, 25, was raised, is one of the motivations for her applying to become a member of the Prime Minister’s Youth Council.

Mazhero, a Zimbabwean-Canadian, is now one of 10 members of the council and the lone member from Nunavut. The appointments were announced last week.

A recent graduate of Concordia University in Montreal, Mazhero said she intends to use this appointment as an opportunity to advocate for minorities in Canada and to address systemic barriers marginalized communities face.

Born in Vancouver to parents from Zimbabwe, Mazhero moved with her family to Chesterfield Inlet when she was four years old. Her father, a teacher, and mother, a nurse, were looking for adventure and a magazine advertised jobs in Chesterfield Inlet. Her mother still lives there today.

Mazhero says it was a challenge to fit into Chesterfield Inlet since she is not Inuit. But she acclimated to life in the community by learning Inuktitut and traditional sewing.

In 2007, at the age of 11, Mazhero moved with her father to Montreal. While living in the city, she realized the resources available to her in Chesterfield Inlet — like affordable housing and health services — were not comparable to Montreal.

Sarah Mazhero as a child in Chesterfield Inlet. (Photo courtesy of Sarah Mazhero)

This disparity in living conditions, along with her experiences with racism as a Black Canadian, were motivating factors in the advocacy work that Mazhero continued at Concordia. Along with majoring in political science, Mazhero minored in First Peoples studies.

But Mazhero’s primary accomplishments were through her work as the academic and advocacy co-ordinator for Concordia Student Council. In this role she helped address barriers faced by minorities, such as Black people who are educated in different countries and struggling to get hired for jobs in which they are qualified.

“Being able to expose [those barriers] is where the Concordia Student Union really helped me,” Mazhero said.

This is the work that inspired her to apply to join the youth council, which meets to discuss issues important to young Canadians with the Prime Minister and cabinet members.

“I wanted to see how the decision-making process is made so I can figure out how things happen and how we can figure out solutions,” Mazhero said, describing her reasons for applying.

She says she is especially looking forward to talking to communities across Canada and getting a “grasp of what people think.”

Mazhero’s career plans include going to law school to pursue Indigenous law.

“Being in Nunavut and Chesterfield Inlet was a very prevalent building stone in my life. It really helped me in university figure out what I want to do with my life,” she said.

Mazhero will sit on the youth council for two years.

Correction: This story has been updated to correct Mazhero’s mother’s profession.