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	No Inuit on Truth Commission By Yumimi Pang Northern News Services May 19, 2008 http://nnsl.com/northern-news-services/stories/papers/may19_08trc.html IQALUIT - Some Inuit are disappointed by the lack of Inuit representation on the federal residential school Truth and Reconciliation Commission. "It means that the kind of things that we as a unique group who went through experiences, different from all indigenous people in Canada, are hardly going to get our voice heard at the top level," said Jack Anawak, a former Nunavut MLA and MP. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was completed May 13 with the appointment of new commissioners, Jane Brewin Morley, a lawyer, facilitator and mediator and Claudette Dumont-Smith, a registered nurse who has been actively involved in aboriginal health issues since 1974. Morley and Dumont-Smith will sit alongside Justice Harry LaForme, chair of the commission. The commission will provide an opportunity for people who were part of the Indian residential schools legacy of abuse to share their experiences and have them recorded. Peter Irniq, former Commissioner of Nunavut, said he was concerned that the commission would not have the same impact because it was missing representation from the Inuit population. "I want our people to speak freely about it," said Irniq. "We went through a lot of trauma at the hands of people who were supposed to be our (surrogate) mothers, fathers. We were all impacted." Irniq, who attended four years of residential school in the late 1950s and early 1960s, including time in Chesterfield Inlet, added that the schools disrupted Inuit culture, language and spirituality. Joe Krimmerdjuar, a court translator living in Pond Inlet who attended residential schools in the late 1950s and early 1960s including eight years at Chesterfield Inlet, does not hesitate in calling his experiences in the system terrible. Like Irniq and Anawak, Krimmerdjuar suffered abuse in the residential school system. He described his school as a cold environment, but also noted that the quality of education was good. He highlighted the effects of being separated from one's parents. "When we were with our parents, we were like flowers, very strong roots. The minute we were on the aircraft, it was like the flower was pulled from its roots, from the ground," said Krimmerdjuar. "For so many years I couldn't look at anyone in the eye. The shame, the embarrassment." As yet, no scheduling decisions have been made for if or when the commission will be travelling to Nunavut. The commission will begin its work on June 1. Prime Minister Stephen Harper is scheduled to apologize on the government's behalf for the abuse suffered by former students in residential schools on June 11 in the House of Commons. Irniq said he has no comment about the Prime Minister's scheduled apology with regard to the residential schools until he hears the content of the apology. "It's interesting (Harper) would do that after doing away with the Kelowna Accord and the U.N. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples," said Anawak, making reference to two policies aimed to improve aboriginal living standards and rights, recently rejected by the Canadian government.
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