Around 150 people marched in Vancouver Friday to spotlight missing and murdered Indigenous boys, men and two-spirit people across the country.
The event was the third annual march in an effort to raise awareness and advocate for a group whose disappearances and murders deserve a lot more attention, said event organizer Dakota Holmes.
“We’re just here to seek justice for their names and make sure they’re known and not overlooked or not heard,” Holmes said.
Indigenous men were seven times more likely to be murdered than non-Indigenous counterparts and four times more likely to die by homici than Indigenous women, according to 2020 data from Statistics Canada.
Hundreds of people hit the street around False Creek on Friday to remember missing and murdered Indigenous men, boys and two-spirit people. As CBC’s Sohrab Sandhu reports, people who took part say they want to raise awareness for loved ones they feel are overlooked.
Last year, Ottawa announced more than $95 million over five years to help Indigenous families get information about missing or murdered loved ones, including services to the families of male victims. The Assembly of First Nations called on the federal government last September to immediately launch a national inquiry into missing, murdered and neglected Indigenous men, boys, and two-spirit people.
On Friday morning, the crowd started at the Vancouver Police Department’s headquarters before walking and drumming to Creekside Park. Families carried banners demanding justice for their brothers, fathers and sons.
For Eugenia Oudie, this was her third rally.
For years, she has been calling attention to the death of her 26-year-old son, Charles, who was found in a storm drain in East Vancouver in 2015. Police called his death a “tragic accident,” but his family has been trying to have the case reinvestigated.
“Since he passed away, I’ve been trying to get awareness so that he could get justice,” she said.
Oudie is also a master’s student at the University of Northern British Columbia working on a thesis about missing and murdered men and boys.
Corrine Chief said she travelled from Winnipeg to bring awareness to the death of Felix Bernard Chief, her 28-year-old brother who died following an unprovoked attack in 2021. The man who stabbed him was sentenced to seven years in prison, but Chief said she is unsatisfied with the length of the sentence.
Chief brought her young son to the march, who was close with Bernard.
“We all miss him and we all love him,” Chief’s son said. “And I want to just see him one more time.”