First ever Stolen Sisters march for Victoria

Activist Rose Henry of Sliammon has a list of names she keeps close to her heart. On it are the names of the women who have gone missing from her life-Marnie, Agnes, Belinda, Bobby. She reads out the names on the steps of the BC legislature. Michelle, she says, was a street girl that went missing a few years ago.
"They found her remains, but they still never found who did this, who took her from us."
Henry was among a throng of concerned citizens who took part in the first-ever Stolen Sisters march and rally to take place in British Columbia's capital city.
People from all walks of life, all races, both genders, gathered on Feb. 14, wearing the color red to represent the blood of the mothers, sisters, aunts and daughters who have gone missing or have met violent deaths at the hands of perpetrators who have gone unpunished.
Hundreds crowded the streets, beating their drums and shouting "We are the outcry," making noise for those missing and murdered Aboriginal women whose voices have been silenced. The goal was to raise a ruckus to show Canada's elected leaders that people care and that something must be done to achieve justice for these women.
Jade Bell walked that day, telling Windspeaker that it was the first protest she had ever taken part in her long life.
"We need to look for them. We need to find them. They disappeared and nobody seems to care, so I'm here to show that I care," she said.
Shane Calder joined his wife and baby in the march.
"This is an incredibly critical issue. The government is ultimately responsible for what has been nothing but misogyny on the part of sectors of this society. I'm really hoping that when people read the newspapers tomorrow morning they'll know that people came out to support women in general and certainly the victims of violence and I'm hoping something will happen from that," he shared.
Cliff Atleo, Sr., the president of the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council, traveled to lend his support to the effort.
"Some of the questions that we need to ask is how come it's so easy to think about bailing out General Motors, Ford Motors? How come it's so easy to have billions of dollars roll off your tongue, because we are worried about the state of the economy? And it's so difficult to actually put our thinking caps on and figure out how we are going to solve this problem of so many Indigenous women lost or murdered, unsolved murders.
"Who with any kind of conscience accepts that?....We live in a province and a country that does so," he said.
Ann-Marie Livingston of Pacheedaht near Port Renfrew was accompanied by her step-mother Maxine Matilpi from Alert Bay. They came in full regalia, carrying a poster board covered with photocopied pictures, paper hearts and flowers. Livingston had wrapped herself in the ceremonial blanket made by the woman seen in those photographs, her mother, Elsie Jones Sebastian, who had been missing since 1991 or '92.
Livingston's last contact with her mother was in '91. After a family breakdown, and her subsequent involvement with drugs and alcohol, Sebastian had been living in Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside. Despite filing police reports in the 1990s, said Livingston, no action on the disappearance of her mother was ever taken until about five years ago.
At the time the police were investigating the crimes of murderer Robert Willie Pickton, who preyed on the street women of that area.
"As family members we submitted DNA samples to the RCMP at the time they were investigating the Pickton farm. We also had to go to RCMP headquarters and identify personal items that were found on the farm, various jewelry, clothing, shoes, purses.
"It was horrifying. There were hundreds of items that they found on the farm."
Livingston's family was unable to identify any items as belonging to Sebastian, and the story of her disappearance remains a mystery.
Livingston said she had mixed emotions about attending the rally that day where she would share information about her mother. She said she felt grief and loss and sadness, but was also encouraged by the number of people who had come out to lend support and bring awareness to the issue of the lost women.
Leslie McGarry, the cultural and community liaison with the Victoria Native Friendship Centre, had been asked by organizers to address the crowd. She said that when people gather, it is also the ancestors take part, so she got up that morning and invited the murdered women to be with the participants of the rally that day.
"Just as we would do in a big house during potlatch season, we invite our ancestors to join us."
Clutched in her hand as she spoke was a rolled up ream of paper with the names of all the women in British Columbia who were either missing or murdered.
She said, when she had read the profiles of those women, there became apparent a common thread among them. The ones that were taken on the highway of tears (between Prince George and Prince Rupert), for example, were running toward something; something better than was being offered on reserve, she said.
"Almost every one of these women is listed as energetic and enthusiastic, brilliant, talented. These are not women who didn't have a goal or an objective. These are women who had hopes and dreams, just like every one of us."
The common thread was that they were running to something. "Their only crime was asking for a ride," McGarry said.
Livingston described her mother as courageous, creative, loving.
"She had a great sense of humor. She used to dance around our house and sing songs... she loved music. I heard on the radio yesterday 'Hey Jude' by the Beatles. That was her favorite song. She liked the Eagles and country music.
"She was a person."
The many speakers at the rally each encouraged the Stolen Sisters march participants to use their networks of colleagues and friends to talk about the people behind the names of the missing and murdered. The speakers urged the participants to continue their pressure on governments across Canada to take the women's disappearances and violent deaths seriously.
NDP MLA Scott Fraser (Alberni-Qualicum) was one of only two provincial government representatives to attend the rally. The NDP's Doug Routley of Cowichan attended as well.
"I just want you to know that we have raised these issues in the legislature," said Fraser, "because there is a leadership role that's not happening from either the provincial or the federal government here, and they've got to pull their heads out of the sand."
"I've met with families that have lost their loved ones on the highway of tears and they are not getting any support. They are feeling abandoned."
He said if women were disappearing from the tony Point Grey area of Vancouver, Liberal Premier Gordon Campbell's constituency, there would be a "whole lot of resources" flowing there to solve the crisis.
"It's not right and it's not justice," said Fraser.
"This is the worst combination. It's racism combined with sexism, and it's the most tragic result possible from that," he said.
"Silence in the face of injustice is injustice, and it's us, it's you, we're not being silent. And we can't be. We mustn't be. You push your political leaders to do something about this. They have to acknowledge that there is a problem if they are going to fix it. They are not even doing that."