CANADA
Montreal Gazette
By Christopher Curtis, The Gazette April 24, 2013
MONTREAL — It may be painful and profoundly troubling, but Canadians need to have a serious conversation about residential schools.
Michaëlle Jean’s voice resounded sharply as she described the need for all Canadians to embrace aboriginal issues as their own. The former governor-general was in Montreal Wednesday to take part in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission — a $60-million project aimed at documenting the systematic torment suffered by generations of aboriginals who were forced into Canada’s residential school system.
Jean served as governor-general when the TRC was launched during a ceremony at Ottawa’s Rideau Hall in 2009. She became an honorary witness at the roving commission’s first national event in Winnipeg, where elders described the unspeakable acts of abuse they survived during childhoods spent as wards of the federal government.
“It was the start of a dialogue, it was very troubling to hear the testimonies, sometimes disturbing, but there was also hope,” Jean told a group of reporters huddled in a hallway inside the Queen Elizabeth Hotel downtown. “Because it was about sharing, sharing of the facts about this very dark chapter of our history. … I think the role of this commission is breaking the role of indifference. Indifference is not an option, we need to confront history together and see how we want to move forward.”
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.