July 28, 2000
VALERIE G. CONNELL
Nunatsiaq News
IQALUIT — The international Women’s March 2000 came to Nunavut last Saturday.
A world-wide campaign involving 155 countries around the globe, the woman’s march was launched March 8, International Women’s Day, and culminates at the United Nations in New York on Oct. 17, the International Day for the Elimination of Poverty.
The main focus of the campaign is the eradication of violence against women and a protest against women’s poverty.
The march marks a historic time for the women’s movement in Canada, says Pam Kapoor, the national organizer of the women’s march in Canada.
Kapoor was in Iqaluit last week to provide resources developed for women to organize in their own communities.
Twenty people gathered at Iqaluit’s Arctic College campus on Saturday for an event sponsored by the Public Service Alliance’s regional women’s committee to learn more about the march and to share ideas and concerns about women in Nunavut. The day ended with people making personal commitments to actions they can carry out in their homes and communities.
The regional women’s committee is hosting public film nights on the 15th of every month in the staff lounge at Arctic College’s Iqaluit campus.
The films focus on women’s issues, said Mary Ellen Thomas, of the regional women’s committee.
Kapoor said women across Canada and around the globe are developing their own projects in connection with the March and tailoring them to fit their local needs.
The Canadian Women’s March Committee (CWMC) represents 24 national organizations and has an office in Toronto. CWMC has developed a document called "It’s Time for Change," a set of 59 demands directed at the government of Canada.
The demands include: restoration of federal heath care funding; the budgeting of more money for social housing; the creation of a national child-care fund, and more support for women’s organizations and pay equity.
"The ‘Feminist 13’ is a list of 13 of the demands that are things that can be done immediately," Kapoor said.
The demands will be presented to the federal government in meetings scheduled between the government and women from the CWMC in Ottawa this October. They’ll end with a march on Parliament Hill to coincide with a march at the UN Oct. 17.
The committee has also developed an organizing manual "Tools for Change," which is being distributed to groups around the country, Kapoor said. The manual introduces the CWMC and provides information on organizing campaigns.
"You could drop it into any community," Kapoor said.
The women’s march was born in Quebec in 1995, when thousands of women from all over the province joined together in the "Bread and Roses March Against Poverty," the largest effort of its kind in Canadian history and organized by the Fédération des femmes du Québec, Kapoor said.
In 1996, women travelled all across Canada, some beginning in Vancouver and others in Newfoundland in a march that ended on Parliament Hill to raise awareness about poverty among women and children.
Kapoor said she is unable to keep track of all the activities and projects happening in communities across the country, since there are so many groups and communities getting involved.
She spoke of the role of technology in connecting women all across the globe.
"Those who were anti-tech need to say, ‘Okay, it’s here. How do we access it and make sure it’s available to everyone?" Kapoor said.
"A tiny village in rural France struggling with genetically modified organisms linking with women in rural India...," she said.
Women in Iceland have been organizing for the march, and no one knew for several months, Kapoor said.
Kapoor said she and the CWMC hope to have something in place to carry on the work begun by the women’s march after her term as coordinator ends in December.
"This is not the end but a beginning — a springboard," Kapoor said.
Information about the World March can be found on the CWMC web site at www.canada.marchofwomen.org