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Thread ID: 6218 | Posts: 1 | Started: 2003-04-17
2003-04-17 21:37 | User Profile
[SIZE=2]Tribute to human rights[/SIZE]
Michael Friscolanti
National Post
The federal government today will pledge $30-million to the construction of a world-class museum on Winnipeg's riverfront that will chronicle the evolution of human rights in Canada and around the world.
The Canadian Museum for Human Rights, which will also receive financial support from the provincial and municipal governments, is the brainchild of media mogul Israel Asper, who has spent years lobbying Ottawa to build a prestigious national monument outside the nation's capital.
"We spend a lot of time and effort trying to create a sense of Canadian identity and national unity and a lot of other clichés," Mr. Asper, the founder of CanWest Global Communications, said yesterday. "But we don't do the things that are needed to create that cohesion."
Construction of the museum, which is expected to cost $270-million, could begin as early as next year.
The idea for the historic facility can be traced back to 1983, when Mr. Asper first suggested the idea to then-prime minister Pierre Trudeau, but efforts to transform the vision into reality did not begin in earnest until three years ago.
After exhaustive consultations with architects, engineers, economic experts and all levels of government, the Asper Foundation, Mr. Asper's charitable foundation, has created a working model for a facility that is expected to rival most other Canadian landmarks.
An architect has yet to be chosen, but preliminary sketches of the 18,500-square-metre museum include a 21-storey Tower of Hope, a dormitory for visiting students, and a wide array of interactive exhibits dedicated to examining racial, religious and sexist intolerance.
"It will tell the country's human rights story with its warts as well as its beauty marks," said Mr. Asper, who is scheduled to officially announce the plans for the museum at a news conference today with Sheila Copps, the Minister of Canadian Heritage.
Mr. Asper said the facility was **inspired by the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., which receives hundreds of thousands of visitors every year.
However, while the Canadian museum will have a wing dedicated to the atrocities of the Holocaust, the facility in Winnipeg will examine all types of human rights issues, from the works of Nelly McClung to the case of Aylin Otano-Garcia, a Cuban-born girl who was lured from her Montreal-area home to a remote sand pit and bludgeoned to death because of her ethnic heritage.**
[color=blue]Not content to be a mere typical memorial to gassees. No sir. This one aims higher -- a monument to white manââ¬â¢s malpractice the world over. However, it will still be interesting to ascertain the final square footage devoted to Jew-sufferings versus hardships incurred by others.[/color]
During a conference call yesterday, Mr. Asper tried to quell concerns by critics who contend tax dollars are being funnelled into an institution that will mark the suffering of one race at the expense of others.
"This museum will be totally apolitical and antiseptic in terms of trying to preach a message of one kind of inhumanity over another," said Mr. Asper, adding that numerous lobby groups, from aboriginal organizations to gay and lesbian groups, have thrown their support behind the project.
[color=blue]Pass the salt, please.[/color]
"One is going to have to be very, very careful to prevent it from becoming a propaganda device for a particular political point of view. And remember, we're not dealing with current politics. We're dealing with the history and the evolution of Canadian human rights."
When asked whether Palestinian organizations would have an opportunity to submit proposals for exhibits, Mr. Asper stressed that everyone would have a chance to provide input.
"Let's say the Palestinians want to make a case and their case is the refugees," he said. "And then you would say: 'That's fine, there were 650,000 Palestinian refugees from the war of 1948 and there were 850,000 Jewish expulsions from Morocco, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, etc. So we'll tell both stories."
The museum is to be built on 4.9 hectares of vacant land along the Forks, which connect the Red and Assiniboine rivers.
On top of Ottawa's $30-million -- which is expected to be only a first instalment -- the Manitoba government and Winnipeg city council will each donate $20-million to the project.
Within weeks, organizers will launch a fundraising drive aimed at soliciting another $60-million from the private sector. If that drive comes up short, Mr. Asper, who has pledged to be the top individual donor, has agreed to make up the difference.
The remaining funding is expected to come from the federal government at a later date.
"There is the understanding and the handshake and statement of intent that somehow folks, we're going to get something done," said Mr. Asper, who saved most of his praise yesterday for Jean Chrétien.
"We wouldn't be here if it weren't for Prime Minister Chrétien," Mr. Asper said. "Every time this thing got turned back by some department because it didn't meet this or it didn't meet that, the Prime Minister simply said to the ministers: 'Go find a way.' "
Until every necessary penny is saved, incoming donations will be kept in a trust fund, with a small amount being used to fund soil tests, operating manuals and an architectural design competition.
Local architects in Winnipeg are already abuzz about the chance to be part of the historic building. Some of the world's best-known builders, including Frank Gehry, who is most famous for the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, Spain, are expected to submit proposals.
Apart from its cultural significance, the museum is also expected to boost the local economy. During the construction phase, the project will generate 3,600 jobs and total tax revenues of $39.1-million. When it is built, the museum will create 220 full-time equivalent jobs in the fields of education and visitor service while generating $6.3-million worth of annual tax revenues.
But for Mr. Asper, the museum is about more than just dollar signs. It is a way to ensure Canadians have a place to learn about the origins of the rights they enjoy every day.
Guests, who will be given Palm Pilots to help record their tours, will begin their visit in a sculpture garden before moving on to the museum's Grand Hall. The epicentre of the museum, the hall is expected to include lecture theatres, cinemas and an exhibit honouring the winners of the Pierre E. Trudeau Award for Human Rights, which are being awarded annually by the museum's board of directors.
Patrons will then be encouraged to watch a short documentary film that outlines "the world's history of intolerance and injustice" before continuing on to the Causes Gallery, where a virtual narrator will explore the origins of "hatred and conflict and enduring desire for justice and dignity."
The next exhibit, entitled Hall of Fame/Walk of Shame, will highlight historic figures in the fight to both improve and suppress human rights.
[color=blue]More tribute to the God of Evil.[/color]
The Holocaust Gallery will be followed by an exhibit entitled Responses, which profiles such human rights champions as Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela.
Canadian Stories, another permanent exhibit, will provide visitors with a synopsis of Canada's human rights failures and accomplishments, from aboriginal ghettoization to the creation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which was signed into law 21 years ago today.
The tour will end with a journey up the Tower of Hope, where visitors can study replicas of different charters and constitutions from around the world.
[url=http://www.nationalpost.ca/national/story.html?id=C8DB7C3B-66A7-4769-AB6D-626CBF87946E]hwww.nationalpost.ca[/url]