Saskatchewan Polytechnic campuses across the province were commemorating the death of Louis Riel Friday with the raising of the Métis flag.

The flag raising is an annual event at the post-secondary institution.

Shelley Belhumeur is the student advisor for Indigenous strategy at the institution’s Prince Albert campus.

“As a community, he was one of our great leaders and so we always celebrate his death by raising the flags,” she says.

Belhumeur says this is the fourth year Saskatchewan Polytechnic has hosted the flag-raising event.

“It’s a simultaneous flag raising that we started about three years ago. We’ve been raising flags for celebrating Louis Riel’s death for many years but we decided at Sask. Polytech, the four campuses, we decided to do everything at the same time, to do it simultaneously.”

Louis Riel was hanged for treason by the government of Sir John A. MacDonald on November 16th, 1885 for his role in the Métis uprising.

Canadian historians have largely condemned the move as one of the most tragic mistakes by a federal government in the post-Confederation years.

Saskatchewan Polytechnic has campuses in Regina, Saskatoon, Moose Jaw and Prince Albert.

(PHOTO: Saskatchewan Polytechnic student advisor for Indigenous strategy Shelley Belhumeur (left) and Prince Albert MLA Nicole Rancourt (right) get ready to raise the Metis flag at the institution’s Prince Albert campus. Photo by Fraser Needham)