1999: THE YEAR IN REVIEW: Canada's Ukrainians: making their mark (12/26/99)

1999: THE YEAR IN REVIEW

Canada's Ukrainians: making their mark

For Ukrainians in Canada the year began auspiciously, as the federal government agreed for the first time to extend the period that Parliament Hill in Ottawa was lit up for the Christmas season until January 8, to accommodate those celebrating by the old (Julian) calendar, and it ended on an even better note when Sarkis Assadourian, the Liberal Party member of parliament (MP) for Brampton Center announced on December 3, as the lights were being turned on once again, that the practice would be permanent.

In fact, 1999 was a year during which the Syrian-born Armenian Canadian surfaced as a man whose efforts have more than just symbolic worth for the Ukrainian Canadian community.

Prime Minister Jean Chrétien's visit to Ukraine and Poland in January helped place debate on the establishment of an inclusive Ottawa-based museum commemorating victims of genocide and crimes against humanity on the public agenda. Throughout the year, Mr. Assadourian's push for Bill C-479 (later rebadged as Bill C-224) helped focus Ukrainian lobbying in this area (see sidebar).

Ukrainians in politics

Federal Liberal MP Walt Lastewka, from St. Catharines, also the parliamentary secretary to the minister for industry, accompanied Mr. Chrétien on his Kyivan foray in January.

In May, Gene Zwozdesky, the Alberta member of the legislative assembly (MLA) for Edmonton-Mill Creek who shocked the Liberals by crossing the floor to the ruling Progressive Conservatives (PCs) in August 1998, was rewarded with a position in the Cabinet. He was appointed as Premier Ralph Klein's associate minister of health and wellness, making him responsible for the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission, the Premier's Council on the Status of Persons with Disabilities, and Health Promotion and Prevention. At that time, he was also appointed Deputy Government House Leader.

In June Gerard Kennedy was re-elected as a member of the Ontario Provincial Parliament (an MPP) in the High Park-Parkdale riding and appointed the Liberal Party's education critic. In November, Mr. Kennedy, who boasts a Ukrainian background on his mother's side, played an active part in commemorations marking the 66th anniversary of the famine-genocide in Ukraine.

Tory (PC) Gerry Martiniuk was also re-elected in the Cambridge riding and subsequently appointed as parliamentary assistant to the attorney general and the minister of native affairs in Premier Mike Harris's second-term majority government.

In September Saskatchewan Premier Roy Romanow led the New Democratic Party (NDP) back to office in a closely contested election, this time only with a minority government. On September 30 Mr. Romanow announced a coalition with fellow Ukrainian Dr. Jim Melenchuk, leader of the provincial Liberal Party, who was given the post of education minister.

Three others with Ukrainian backgrounds also made it into Mr. Romanow's Cabinet: Joanne Crofford, appointed minister of labor; Doreen Hamilton will fill the post of minister responsible for the Saskatchewan Property Management Corp. and the Liquor and Gaming Authority; while Clay Serby will be minister of municipal affairs.

Also in September, Manitoba Tory Gary Filmon lost his bid to return as premier, apparently unable to overcome the taint of scandal that forced the resignation of his former chief-of-staff Taras Sokolyk. However, former PC ministers Len Derkach, Darren Praznik and Frank Pitura managed to keep their seats in the Manitoba legislature.

Manitoba now also has an NDP government, led by Gary Doer, who named three Ukrainians to his Cabinet: David Chomiak (minister of health and minister of sport), Roseann Wowchuk (minister of agriculture and food) and Mary Ann Mihaychuk (minister of industry and trade). Doug Martindale (married to a Ukrainian, and whose children are being raised in the Ukrainian Bilingual Program in Winnipeg) and Bonnie Korzenowski were also re-elected as NDP MLAs.

Manitoba's elections were like an all-Ukrainian Canadian free-for-all. In this round of ballotting, 10 ran for the NDP (five elected), eight for the PCs (three elected) and seven for the Liberals (all of whom lost).

On November 6 the community lost one of its greatest leaders, as Laurence Decore succumbed after a long and recurring battle with cancer. The former mayor of Edmonton, leader of the Alberta Provincial Liberal Party and champion of multiculturalism in Canada died in Edmonton at the age of 59.

Community institutions

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC), the Winnipeg-based national umbrella body, had an eventful year. Guided by its president, Montréal-based attorney Eugène Czolij, and vice-president, Adrian Boyko, the UCC charted a deliberate path, seeking to restore its credibility as a representative body for Ukrainians in Canada, particularly in the eyes of the federal government.

In February its representatives presented a brief to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission hearings in Winnipeg. on policy for "ethnic" programming. As the CRTC embarked on a periodic review (the last one was conducted in 1994) of the publicly funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) a few weeks later, the UCC also took the opportunity to make itself heard, seeking 10 hours per week of "ethnic" broadcasting and establish a process whereby its adherence to the Canadian Multiculturalism Act in the creation of programming could be vetted.

In May the UCC Board of Directors ratified a three-year action plan for the organization's various committees, based in part on the resolutions of the 19th triennial congress, held the previous October.

This year's high-water mark for the UCC came, in part through the offices of the UCC-affiliated Taras Shevchenko Foundation President Andrew Hladyshevsky, when it secured a long-sought meeting with Justice Minister and Attorney General Anne McLellan.

On August 25 Mr. Czolij and three colleagues were granted an audience with Canada's top lawyer, to discuss matters of ranging from the prosecution of war criminals in Canada (see sidebar), the internment of Ukrainian Canadians in 1914-1920 and the reopening of channels of communication with other ministries and departments to proposals for a Canadian Museum of Genocide (see sidebar).

Whatever the year's successes, the UCC was still bogged down in its efforts to re-open its Ottawa Bureau, and time-lines by which the official website was to be up and running came and went. (At press time, http://www.ucc.ca features a very slow-loading logo, an "Under Construction" sign, and a count of about 4,400 disappointed visitors since the homepage outpost went up in January.)

As usual, since it has led the way for the past decade in terms of organizational reform, the UCC's Saskatchewan Provincial Council boasted the widest range of activity of the regional bodies, from organizing local cultural events to co-sponsoring a nationwide study of the use and misuse of pharmaceuticals by the elderly as well as shepherding business, agricultural and scientific exchanges with Ukraine.

After years of quiescence under the slack hand of Dr. Evhen Roslyckyj, UCC's Ontario Provincial Council (OPC) came roaring back to life under the leadership of Sudbury-based activist Walter Halchuk, elected on June 24 at the first OPC general meeting to be held in four years.

Upon assuming office, Mr. Halchuk said that he would stress communications. Newspaper editors and e-mail networks across the country know that he was as good as his word - producing a deluge of impassioned responses and up-to-the-minute press releases.

The UCC's British Columbia Provincial Council marked the 10th anniversary of its establishment during 1999.

The UCC Toronto Branch, led by its president Maria Szkambara, was particularly active in lobbying on the denaturalization and deportation and internment issues and in offering its support to Mr. Assadourian's effort to establish a Museum of Reconciliation, an inclusive institution under the administrative control of Canada's Museum of Civilization that would commemorate the victims of genocide and other crimes against humanity.

The UCC Ottawa Branch, led by Oksana Bashuk Hepburn, made strides to reviving the Friends of Ukraine group on Parliament Hill and also made its voice heard in the nation's capital.

Another community institution, the Ukrainian Canadian Professional and Business Federation, in the 1990s has been a study in unfulfilled potential. Once able to radiate its influence outward into the mainstream and a source of challenges to the Ukrainian community's establishment, it had become relatively quiescent, mostly a forum for debate and exchange of information rather than a hub for ambition.

But this was a convention year, and the newly elected president, Oksana Bashuk Hepburn, appears determined to effect a major change, and use her home base in Ottawa to significant effect. The raft of resolutions she proposed in her acceptance speech drew nervousness from representatives of UCC national in attendance. Would the UCPBF seek to usurp UCC's role?

In short, after that weekend in July, it was back to the old days in a new way. The challenge from the professional and business guard had been issued.

The convention was held in Toronto, and provided two major-league events - the keynote speech by former shuttle astronaut Dr. Roberta Bondar which kicked off proceedings; and the convention-concluding awards banquet that hailed the achievements of such high-profile success stories as film-maker and businessman Roman Kroitor and professional athlete and motivational speaker Terry Evanshen.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian Canadian Students' Union (SUSK), the national body representing post-secondary students across Canada, has also shown signs that it is ready to return to Canada's activist front lines after almost entirely disappearing from view in the 1990s.

The national SUSK congress was held in February in Calgary, Alberta, and the Canadians made an important gesture to its U.S.-based counterparts, throwing them a lifeline. From 1999 onward, student-groups at U.S. universities and colleges will be allowed membership in SUSK, since the U.S.-based umbrella body, the Federation of Ukrainian Student Organizations of America (SUSTA) fell apart some years ago.

In March SUSK's newly elected president took up the cause of the Alberta-Ukraine Agricultural Exchange Society, whose seven-year program was placed in jeopardy by the Canadian government's refusal to grant temporary visas to six to 10 Ukrainians to work on selected Alberta and Canadian farms and learn the methods of more efficient farming.

Mr. Ilnytsky pointedly reminded Canada's prime minister of his commitments. The SUSK leader said, "We ask that [Prime Minister] Jean Chrétien honor the promise he made to Ukraine in Kyiv when he said: 'Ukrainians played a key role in nurturing a young Canada. It is only natural that Canadians now return that favor by helping to nurture the new Ukraine, to be at her side as she builds a durable democracy, as she fosters free markets, and as she continues her opening to the world. My first priority is to reaffirm the support of Canada for the political and economic reform for which [Ukraine has] been striving since independence.'"

Also in the news

While in Kyiv in January, Prime Minister Chrétien had set back the effort to secure recognition and redress for the wrongs done to Ukrainians, when he suggested that his government would make no formal apology to Canada's community. "Yes, I am sorry, but we can't formally apologize for everything," he said, in answer to a student's question during the visit.

And yet, in April, Deputy Prime Minister Herb Gray announced that federal funding would be provided for the development of an educational center at a site marking the former internment camp at Spirit Lake, Québec.

Additionally, another plaque commemorating the victims of the internment operation was unveiled in Victoria, the British Columbian provincial capital, in July.

In her meeting with representatives from the UCC in August, Justice Minister McLellan offered assurances that she would assist the community in raising the issue in the Heritage Ministry (which, Mr. Chrétien decided, would handle government business in the matter).

But then, in December, Canada Post declined to commemorate the tragedy in a special issue of stamps in the year 2000, as lobbied for by the UCCLA.

The Weekly's second issue of the year carried an article about the Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Center (Oseredok) of Winnipeg, and its campaign to reinvigorate and expand its premises and services, led by Executive Director Shelley Greschuk.

On the night of November 5, the Oseredok was caught in a wave of arson that has beset the Manitoba capital. While the center sustained $250,000 in damage (mostly to its first-floor boutique), happily its extensive and irreplaceable collection of archives, art and museum artifacts were not affected. The Weekly carried the stirring reports of the Oseredok's former librarian, Orysia Tracz, as she led the Ukrainian Canadian community's sigh of relief.

Meanwhile, in Toronto, during the night of June 20, the Ukrainian Cultural Center downtown on Christie Street was defaced with graffiti suggesting the center was a gathering-place for Nazis. UCC Ontario and UCCLA activists expressed the community's outrage, and suggested that such incidents were fallout from the Canadian government's unfocused effort in prosecuting World War II era war criminals and loose reporting on the subject in the mainstream media were to blame. Officers from Toronto police force's hate crimes unit were assigned to the case, but its investigations proved inconclusive. It also took a fortnight for workers from the city's Graffiti Removal Unit to arrive to cover up the offensive message.

On July 5, the Canadian Press ran an item referring to racially motivated killings in the U.S. Midwest headlined "Gunman belonged to 'church' founded by Ukrainian Canadian." Four days later, the agency ran a retraction after a storm of protest across Canada.

CP World Editor Paul Loong was praised by the UCCLA's Director of Research Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk for demonstrating "his willingness to consider a problem, deal with it expeditiously and take recommendations for ensuring that similar problems don't arise in the future. He and the CP are to be commended for their fast reaction time and [sensitivity]."

Among other developments in Ukrainian Canadian community life were the following.

In 1999, two Toronto-based newspapers celebrated anniversaries. Homin Ukrainy (Ukrainian Echo) marked its 50th year in the business with a banquet in February, while Novyi Shliakh (New Pathway) celebrated 70 years in print in similar fashion in October.
In June, Kingston's (Ontario) Ukrainian community hosted Albanian refugees from Kosovo during their sojourn at a local Canadian Armed Forces base, providing them with transportation about town and entertainment at the annual Folklore Festival.
Controversy over the Victoria Cross medal awarded to Filip Konowal during the first world war erupted onto the pages of The Weekly's August 1 issue. It turns out that the original has been lost. After three years of a vain search, UCCLA activists, including Royal Canadian Legion member John Gregorovich, assailed Canada's War Museum as an untrustworthy institution, drawing a hot response from current director and military historian Jack Granatstein. "This is a medal won by a serviceman in the Canadian army," he told The Weekly's Chris Guly, "This is not the community's medal. They have neither right nor privileges here."
On April 25 the Ukrainian community of Calgary erected a black granite monument commemorating the Famine-genocide of 1932-1933 in Ukraine. Nine famine survivors were present for the unveiling and the blessing of the monument, which was conducted by Ukrainian Catholic and Orthodox clergy, including Bishop Lawrence Huculak of the Edmonton Eparchy of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. Ukrainian Orthodox Bishop John Stinka said: "There are many pictures that remain forever unobliterated in the minds of the Ukrainian people. There is many a man still suffering from the taint of the evil thing experienced."

Seeking a museum of all genocides

Galicia Division cleared, again

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