Jeff Ward, CEO and found of animikii.com
A software tech company specializing in Aboriginal business is pushing to have National Aboriginal Day declared a statutory holiday.
The CEO of the company Animikii.com, Jeff Ward, was recently published in the Globe and Mail with an editorial asking “Why isn’t it aboriginal day a national holiday?”
He also produced a video that has gone viral with more than 52,000 hits. Ward said he was overwhelmed with the response.
“Within hours of posting the video I was getting calls from other businesses saying, ‘I am going to support you, I’m going to be giving my workers the day off,’” he said.
Ward says there was also a lot of reaction to his editorial in the Globe and Mail. He says some of that was kind of nasty.
“When you read some of that, it is just obviously clear that this is all the more reason we need this day as a stat-holiday,” he said. “That way most other Canadians can learn about Indigenous perspective and history.
Ward is not only the CEO of the British Columbia-based company Animikii.com, he’s the founder. He said a statutory holiday in honour of Canada’s Indigenous people would also fulfill one of the recommendations made in the Truth and Reconciliation report.