The Malahat First Nation will gather and march Friday to honour the children whose unmarked graves have been discovered at Canadian residential schools.
Pamela Mitchell, housing manager for the Malahat Nation, said elders and their family members “want to come together as a community” to remember the thousands of children who were pulled out of their homes and communities and placed in residential schools.
The discovery of 215 unmarked graves at a former Kamloops residential school and this week’s news of hundreds more at a former school site in southern Saskatchewan have torn open fresh wounds in Canada’s dark history with First Nations.
“We want to acknowledge the impact residential schools have had on the [Malahat] people and all Indigenous people,” said Mitchell, who is asking people to wear orange for the event.
The Malahat’s Every Child Matters March will start at 9:30 a.m. Friday at the Big House, located at 1 Longhouse Rd. on Malahat Nation land. The group will depart at 10 a.m. and proceed up Mill Bay Road to the Trans-Canada Highway.
The Malahat Nation is also mourning the loss of an 18-year-old woman who died in a house fire on June 10. Four people escaped the burning home.
On Saturday, it is hosting a bottle drive from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 3175 Cobble Hill Rd. to support Tom and Audrey Harry, elders of Malahat Nation who lost their home and granddaughter in the fire.
Mitchell said the Harrys are respected members and have done much for the community over many years, including taking in and raising children who are in need of homes. Tom, a carver and cultural teacher in the community, is a former councillor and was employed by the First Nation for more than 33 years. Audrey is a long-time health co-ordinator and foster parent.
A campaign to raise funds for the family has already raised more than $21,000, far above the original $2,000 goal.
