The architect of Canadian residential schools was demolished in the state of Toronto Indigenous Rights News

The statue of one of the architects of the Canadian residential school system has been torn down and will not be replaced, said President Ryerson University of Toronto after protesters gathered protesters honored 215 indigenous children whose remains were found in an old school.

Hundreds of people demonstrated in Toronto on Sunday remember and ask for justice found at the end of last month at Kamloops Indian Residential School for children in the western province of British Columbia.

The statue of Egerton Ryerson helped create a system that forced more than 150,000 First Nation, Metis, and Inuit children to separate from their families and attend church boarding schools.

Residential schools, which were open from the 1870s to the 1990s, are believed to have been abused and more than 4,000 indigenous children are believed to have died there, mostly from disease.

Mohamed Lachemi, president and vice-chancellor of Ryerson University, said in a statement that about an hour after the last protesters left, “a truck arrived … and went to tear down the statue of Egerton Ryerson.”

“The state will not be restored or replaced,” Lachemi said.

The overthrow of the state by the Canadian government and the Roman Catholic Church, which ran most of the residential schools, came amid broader calls to address the ongoing damage that organizations have done to indigenous communities.

For years, students and faculty at Ryerson University have called for the removal of the state, in line with broader calls across Canada and abroad to change the name of buildings and institutions – and remove monuments – pay homage to historical figures involved in racist systems, for example slavery.

In late August 2020, the statue of the Prime Minister of Canada, John A Macdonald, who was instrumental in the creation of housing systems, was ousted from a plaza in central Montreal.

Ryerson XIX. He was a figure of the century who was the chief superintendent of education for the province of Ontario.

According to one report Made by Ryerson University’s Aboriginal Education Council (AEC), “though [Ryerson] has not implemented or supervised workflow [residential] in schools, he helped with their plan. “

The report referred to a letter Ryerson sent to the Department of Indian Affairs, in which he wrote about indigenous students: “Nothing can be done without the help of religious sentiment to improve and elevate his character and condition. This information must be added to all others to be a simple and hardworking Indian man.” .

Indigenous students at Ryerson University said last month that they would begin calling the school “X University” in an effort to “remove Ryerson’s name and that symbol of cultural genocide and intergenerational trauma.”

“For us, there is no debate about unifying Ryerson’s legacy. It doesn’t matter how many non-indigenous historians send exclusive letters in favor of Egerton. From the perspective of indigenous students, it cannot be reconciled, ”they wrote open letter on May 11th.

Meanwhile, indigenous communities and survivors of residential schools are renewing their long-standing demand The Catholic Church apologizes for its role in the abuses that have taken place in the institutions.

A man crushes his head from a statue of Egerton Ryerson after being taken out on June 6 at Ryerson University in Toronto. [Nick Lachance/Reuters]

Gerry Shingoose, a 63-year-old survivor of a residential school, has told Al Jazeera that he wants to apologize to Pope Francis, see allegations of abuse, and that the Catholic Church release all records about residential schools publicly.

“I am seeking justice for 215 children and as yet undiscovered children. “I’m looking for justice for those who live in a boarding school,” he said.

Sunday, Pope Francis he expressed “pain” in the discovery Among the 215 indigenous children in Kamloops, however, he did not offer a survivor of the residences their families and their communities had long sought forgiveness for.