The statue of the first Prime Minister of Canada which had been unbolted by anti-racist demonstrators in 2020 at Place du Canada, in Montreal, must not be reinstalled, pleads the committee which studied this issue.
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The bronze statue representing John A. Macdonald, which had been repeatedly sprayed with paint in the years preceding its unbolting, has no place on its pedestal in the eyes of the committee members.
“Considering the assimilation and genocidal policies that it implemented against the indigenous peoples and the discriminatory acts that it perpetrated against several groups of people […]the committee believes, in the spirit of the reconciliation process, that it is necessary to distance ourselves from this legacy of John A. Macdonald and the colonial vision represented by the monument”, pleaded the authors of the report to advise the City of Montreal on the future of the statue.
On the other hand, the base of the statue itself should remain in place as a “duty of memory”, even if it means adding a new explanatory plaque.
“Although the permanent absence of the statue from the plinth which has showcased it for 125 years represents in itself the rejection of the values and actions of this disputed figure, the committee believes that it is necessary to add to this absence a renewed interpretation program that could take different forms to reflect the importance and complexity of the issues,” reads the report.
The unbolting of the statue, during a demonstration on August 29, 2020, caused a stir at the time. Prime Minister François Legault had notably promised that the statue would be restored and put back in place, but the mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante, had instead opted for the creation of a committee to determine what to do with the statue.
John A. Macdonald’s controversial legacy for his role in creating the residential school system has also overshadowed other monuments erected in his honor across the country in recent years, including in his hometown of Kingston, Ontario.