Frustrated families vow to ‘blockade’ missing and murdered inquiry hearings

Jocelyn Wabano-Iahtail, right, comforts Shirley Gunner, as John Fox looks on during a news conference regarding the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls national inquiry in Ottawa. (Justin Tang/Canadian Press)

Father of murdered woman says inquiry is at a ‘crisis’ point

By John Paul Tasker, CBC News, May 23, 2017

Some family members of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls are vowing to blockade meetings of the national inquiry to protest what they call a disastrous start.

“We are prepared to take blockades against this inquiry, if it goes through our communities we will be there, it doesn’t matter where,” John Fox told reporters Tuesday.

Ottawa launches long-awaited inquiry into missing, murdered indigenous women

By Kristy Kirkup, The Canadian Press, August 3, 2016

GATINEAU, Que. – Family members wiped away tears Wednesday as the federal government outlined the terms of an inquiry into the phenomenon of missing and murdered aboriginal women – along with a price tag nearly $14 million higher than expected.

Three cabinet ministers were on hand inside the Museum of History’s great hall – a space bedecked with long houses, totem poles and artwork dedicated to Canada’s First Nations – to hand the reins of the nascent inquiry to independent commissioners.

Government not doing enough to share details of MMIW inquiry, family members say

‘It’s all rumoured on Facebook and social media,’ says sister of homicide victim

CBC News,  July 21, 2016

The federal government needs to do a better job of communicating details about a long-awaited inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women, says Mag Cywink, whose sister Sonya Cywink was slain in London, Ont. in 1994.

In June, the government signaled that an announcement about the inquiry was coming soon — that didn’t happen. Families then expected details of the inquiry to be released in early July, but weeks later there has still been no official announcement.