Three Indigenous leaders are being honoured with their likeness being represented on stamps sold by Canada Post.
The first of the three was unveiled today in Regina, as Harry Daniels was honoured.
Daniels, from Regina Beach, spent 40 years advocating for Métis rights before he died in 2004.
Daniels’s widow, Cheryl Storkson, said seeing her late husband’s portrait on the stamp is an indescribable feeling.
“It was such a beautiful and fantastic feeling and something that I never expected,” she said. “It’s the biggest honour in the world. I just feel so honoured to have been with him all those years.”
Daniels fought for the rights of the Métis people, with his most significant contribution to Indigenous rights in Canada in the Supreme Court case Daniels v. Canada, which guaranteed that Métis and Non-Status Indians are considered “Indian” under the Constitution Act, 1867.
Storkson said that people will now always remember him.
“Just what an honourable man he was and how he fought so hard and was so dedicated to his work, bringing all of these for the Metis, Indian, and Inquate for everybody. He would be so honoured.”
Two other leaders, Jose Kusugak of Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, and Chief Marie-Anne Day Walker-Pelletier, of Fort Qu’Appelle, will have their stamps revealed later this week.
A set of stamps is to be released on National Indigenous Peoples Day on June 2.