Sask. prisoner now 3 months into hunger strike over Indigenous inmate conditions | 24CA News
An inmate awaiting trial in Prince Albert has renewed her starvation strike as she has refused to eat meals now for practically three months.
Faith Eagle’s strike comes with a name for change in how Indigenous individuals are handled in Canadian prisons.
Read extra:
Inmate starvation strike highlights issues dealing with Indigenous folks in jail
Read More
“I think about food, I’m hungry… but I also realize what our ancestors went through and what our people are going through right now,” Eagle mentioned.
Behind the partitions of the Pine Grove Correctional Centre in Prince Albert, Eagle has consumed little greater than Gatorade, Boost dietary drinks and water because the second week of September.
It was solely after a visit to the hospital in mid-November that she had a small meal.
“I needed something in my stomach to eat, so I had a sandwich, a juice box, a banana and that was it,” Eagle defined. “And then they were all happy and whatever, but I said no, this is round two.”
That ‘second round’ is occurring whereas Eagle awaits her trial on assault costs.
She started her protests as a method to increase consciousness about her residing situations, which she nonetheless calls too chilly, too remoted and too unsanitary.
The protest she mentioned is a means to assist inform as many individuals as doable about the way in which Indigenous individuals are handled whereas incarcerated. Her strike can be to boost consciousness in regards to the variety of Indigenous folks in jail.
“On unit one right now… it’s 100 per cent Indigenous,” Eagle mentioned.
Indigenous individuals are not solely vastly overrepresented in jail populations, but in addition in relation to particular well being outcomes.
Indigenous prisoners accounted for 40 per cent of recorded suicide makes an attempt over the previous decade in federal prisons, 55 per cent of incidents of self-injury in 2021 and 83 per cent of all who died by suicide final 12 months based on the Canadian Government.
Eagle calls the developments a results of colonization, residential faculties and intergenerational trauma, and believes extra cultural programming for inmates and workers, in addition to better entry to elders, may very well be doable options.
“We need to be spiritually balanced, emotionally, physically and mentally,” Eagle defined. “We don’t have that unless we ask for it, so that’s what I’m speaking up for.”
The provincial authorities mentioned they’re conscious of the protest, however there isn’t lots they’ll do in the mean time as a result of general variety of folks within the facility.
“What she has to say is important, and we need to listen,” Saskatchewan’s corrections minister, Christine Tell, mentioned. “We need to listen but there’s not a lot that we can do about it. Pine Grove correctional facility is overcapacity.”
Eagle, nevertheless, mentioned she has no plans to be quiet on the difficulty till she sees situations enhance.
© 2022 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
