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Canada Day celebrations in Victoria to mark 'new beginning' with First Nations

Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps on Monday, March 16, 2020. (CTV News) Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps on Monday, March 16, 2020. (CTV News)
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The City of Victoria says this year's official Canada Day celebration will mark a "new beginning" in the city's relationship with local First Nations.

To mark the occasion, the city will open its festivities with its first-ever "traditional canoe protocol" that will see Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps cross the Inner Harbour in a canoe and ask Indigenous representatives for permission to come ashore, the city says.

"This year’s Victoria Canada Day has been created in the spirit of honouring the Lekwungen people and their lands and culture and to offer a fun, family-friendly and inclusive event that reflects the diversity of our community and our country," said Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps said in a statement Thursday.

"Asking for permission to come ashore aligns with traditional protocols of visitors to Indigenous lands and is a very meaningful way to honour the Songhees and Esquimalt Nations," she added.

The crossing will begin at 10:30 a.m. Friday and finish at 11:30 a.m. at the southeast corner of the harbour's lower causeway, across from the B.C. legislature grounds.

The protocol will signal the beginning of a daylong celebration of Canada Day in Victoria, including musical performances and a street market, and culminating in a fireworks display at 10:20 p.m.

A full rundown of the day's scheduled events is available here.

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