‘I’m sick of words with no action’: Hundreds gather to demand landfill searches for women’s remains
The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs held a round dance at Winnipeg’s iconic Portage and Main intersection on Friday for International Women’s Day, demanding the provincial and federal governments start searching a landfill for the remains of three women.
“We’re Indigenous women. We’re not trash,” said Priscilla Pacui, one of the estimated 300 people who held hands in the dance or held up signs.
“We need to bring these women home. They’re sacred. Let’s do this.”
Police said a year ago that they believe the remains of Morgan Harris, 39, and Marcedes Myran, 26, went to the Prairie Green landfill, just north of Winnipeg, in May 2022.
The families of the women have been fighting to have the landfill searched.
“I don’t understand how these governments can celebrate our women and our diversity when our women are still laying in landfills, in garbage dumps that remain gravesites to this day. Shame,” shouted Cambria Harris, daughter of Morgan Harris.
“How are you OK with letting women lie underneath piles of trash? What message and what precedent does that send?”
The dance, which started at 10 a.m., preceded a march to the steps of the Manitoba Legislative Building, where Harris and others spoke.
She and others railed at the lack of movement by governments. Chants of “Bring out Wab,” referring to Premier Wab Kinew, chorused outside the legislature.
“I’m sick of words with no action. I’m sick of sitting in these rooms repeatedly [with] politician to politician, from premier to premier, and where has things gone? Nowhere,” Harris said.
Jordan Myran, sister of Marcedes, blasted Kinew for making “promise after promise” after being elected in October, but proving to be “all talk and no action.”
“Let’s make some more noise and maybe he can hear us from in there,” she told the crowd.
“It’s been a long, long fight trying to get my sister home, and a fight that we shouldn’t have to be fighting.”
The trial of the man accused of killing Morgan Harris and Marcedes Myran, as well as two other women, is scheduled to begin at the end of April.
Jeremy Skibicki was charged in December 2022 with first-degree murder in the deaths of Harris, Myran and a still-unidentified woman later given the name Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe, or Buffalo Woman.
He had been arrested and charged with first-degree murder in the death of Rebecca Contois, 24, earlier that year.
“We need to be heard, and so we continuously, continuously have to push that agenda, that narrative, that we be heard as a First Nation people,” AMC Grand Chief Cathy Merrick told CBC Information Radio host Marcy Markusa on Friday morning ahead of the round dance and march.
The AMC — working with input from technical experts, the families of Harris and Myran and others — shared a new landfill search feasibility report with all levels of government in January.
“We’ve done our work. From then on, we requested for a meeting and to be in the same room with the federal and the provincial government, and there has been no response to that effect,” Merrick said.
“We need to remind the government that it’s not going away and this is something that’s very close to the hearts of our our people. We need the government to ensure that they come and they tell us that the funding is going to be in place so that we do that search … for our loved ones that are there.”
Celebrating women
Information Radio on Wednesday was dedicated to celebrating women, with a full slate of female guests.
Merrick, who was elected in October 2022 as the first woman to lead the AMC, was asked what kind of advice she would give to her younger self.
“You be strong. You be proud of who you are. You continue to learn about your language, to learn about your culture, to learn about who you are. And to be a proud person to be able to walk on your journey,” she said.
Her advice for young Indigenous women is to “continue to be who you are, be resilient and be — ensure that you stand up for your rights as a woman.”
She was also asked about her vision for the future.
“We need to ensure that we pave that road for our younger people and that they don’t find it as hard to be able to walk,” she said.
“We are First Nation people. We are the first people of this country and we need to ensure that we always remember our treaties and we always remember who we are and where we come from.”
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