The public is invited to attend a candlelight vigil outside the Fort Frances Courthouse next Monday (Dec. 6) in honour of the 14 young women who were murdered at l’Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal in 1989.
The vigil, slated to start at 5:30 p.m., is being organized jointly by the United Native Friendship Centre and the local Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario.
Everyone is welcome to attend.
“We have to try to eliminate violence against women in our society,” said local ETFO president Sharon Preston. “We have to work together. This is not something that has gone away.”
The format of the event will be much like last year, including a reading of the names of the 14 women killed in Montreal, as well as the names of some local women who suffered violent deaths.
There also will be a short prayer, and a song.
Preston noted the ceremony—meant to remind people that violence against women continues—would not take long.
The ETFO and the UNFC also are planning to release some pamphlets and white ribbons across the district.
The vigil is an extension of ETFO’s programs like anti-bullying and anti-racism.
“We have always been involved in ways and means we can assist not only our own members but the population at large,” Preston noted.
She added the ETFO and UNFC have worked together in the past with great success.
“It has become a very positive, co-operative relationship, and we’re trying to do more things together,” she remarked.
Parliament declared Dec. 6 the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women in 1991.
According to the Status of Women Canada, an agency of the federal government, half of all Canadian women have been victims of at least one act of physical or sexual violence since the age of 16.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
