Michèle Audette | |
---|---|
Born |
Wabush, Labrador, Canada |
July 20, 1971
Nationality | Canadian |
Known for | president of the Native Women's Association of Canada |
Michèle Taïna Audette (born July 20, 1971) is a Canadian politician and Native Canadian activist.
Audette was born in Wabush, and grew up between Schefferville, Maliotenam and Montreal. Her mixed family (her French-Canadian father Gilles Audette came from Montreal and mother Evelyne St-Onge is Innu) was denied a house on reserve. Evelyne was a co-founder of FAQ, who fought against a clause in the "Federal Indian Act" which states that a Native woman who marries a non-Native man can not return to live in her community.
She was president of the Quebec Native Women (FAQ), then the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC). She was also between 2004 and 2008, Associate Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Relations with Citizens and Immigration Quebec government, in charge of the Secretariat for Women. She was also public relations and coordinator of many festivals and Aboriginal Nations researcher, a news magazine broadcast on Télé-Québec.
In the 2015 Canadian federal election, she was the Liberal candidate for the riding of Terrebonne, but she was not elected.
Audette, a mother of five, lives in both Wendake near Québec City and Maliotenam near Sept-Îles, Quebec with her domestic partner Serge Ashini Goupil, a consultant with the indigenous rights group Nation Innue.