PM’s ‘Tiger Team’ meant to address diversity, inclusion in Canada’s national intelligence and security community hasn’t met since 2018
The federal government still has “much work to be done” on addressing diversity and inclusion issues within its intelligence and security apparatus, according to a recent parliamentary committee report, with one leading intelligence expert suggesting more senior leadership within the Privy Council Office with “power and clout” is needed to oversee the problem—and questioning why […]
Racism poisons Canada’s future
OTTAWA—Last week, I had lunch with two exceptional young Canadians, Ayanda and Mordecai. It was both enlightening and disturbing. I have known Ayanda for more than a decade. He worked at the YMCA camp, Kanawana, near Montreal. Ayanda was a counsellor, then a colleague to my children and became a family friend. He was always […]
Deem Indigenous policing essential, boost support for Northern communities to help scrap racism in policing, committee hears
Demilitarize the police, defund or divert their resources, adopt nationwide data collection to track race and use of force, adopt true and transparent civilian oversight, and make Indigenous policing an essential service. These are just some of the calls to action repeatedly raised by witnesses during last week’s parliamentary study on systemic racism and policing […]
Work of reconciliation and anti-racism held back by performative action
OTTAWA—It’s been five years into reconciliation and there’s been a lot of talk and not enough action. It’s time to start naming performative action as the barrier to real change. Performative action is doing just enough to avoid recrimination but not enough to affect real change. For example, the federal government has expressed superficial support […]
‘I must speak, I have no choice but to speak’: CBC’s Adrian Harewood talks about his decades-long fight against systemic racism in the media
CBC Ottawa News anchor Adrian Harewood has been involved in the fight against systemic racism in the media for nearly 30 years, a fight that’s been accelerated in recent weeks and months as much of the Canadian media landscape is now contending with a rising chorus of voices within the journalistic community calling for more […]
Feds recognize ‘there’s more work to be done on diversifying the public service,’ says Liberal MP Alghabra
“Glaring” underrepresentation of visible minorities in the upper echelons of the federal public service—Canada’s largest employer with more than 280,000 employees—continues to be something the Liberal government is looking to address, according to Liberal MP and parliamentary secretary for public service renewal Omar Alghabra, with Canada’s first African Canadian appointed to the Senate calling for […]
Good trouble: Lewis, Mandela, and authentic power
John Lewis, whose scarred, unbreakable skull was a luminous monument to the “good trouble” he so passionately advocated, did not die on Mandela Day. But by the time the world heard about his death, tributes to a man whose journey had stretched from his origins as the son of an Alabama sharecropper to his time as a young lieutenant […]
Don’t silence the voice of justice when it matters
The death of South Africa’s ambassador to Denmark, Zindziswa “Zindzi” Mandela, the daughter of South Africa’s late struggle heroes, has once again reminded me of the enduring legacy of her parents that she strove to continue. Like her mother, Winnie Nomzamo Mandela, and her father Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, Zindzi was firm in her resolve to […]
It’s dictator or bust for Trump
OTTAWA—U.S. President Trump seems increasingly like a mad king—besieged on all sides, raging away in the wreckage of his castle, vowing defeat and destruction to his endless list of perceived enemies. His latest outrage, which led to renewed comparisons of the U.S. under Trump to a Third World dictatorship, came the night of July 10, […]
Forty-nine days of racism in the news
OTTAWA—It’s been 49 days since George Floyd died. It has been forty-nine days of international rally and protest, demands for change, system outrage at demands for change, and general confusion. On that day a Black Canadian was also assaulted by police in Laval. It’s been 49 exhausting days for many Indigenous peoples, black Canadians and […]
