2016-03-10 Thu

In 2018, Canada will for the first time feature a non-queen woman on paper currency as per an official announcement by the Prime Minister and panda-hugger Justin Trudeau. As of now, all the Canadian paper currency feature men, except for the Queen Elizabeth II $20 bill. Citizens of Canada are not in favour of this as she is not even Canadian.

The Bank of Canada is asking Canadians to nominate “bank NOTE-able” women who deserve to be featured on national currency. The potential candidates must be Canadians by birth or naturalization and died 25 or more years ago. The Queen is still alive and hence does not fit the latter requirement. Even then she has been chosen over other potential candidates who fit the criteria like Céline Dion, Shania Twain, Alanis Morrisette and Joni Mitchell.

The common public has been asked to suggest alternatives, which will be shortlisted by an advisory council. The final call will be taken by Canada’s minister of finance.

Below is the list of the official candidates who could feature on the next series of Canadian notes.

Viola Desmond was a black businesswoman, refused to vacate the whites-only section of a Nova Scotia movie theatre which sparked the Canadian civil rights movement.

Pitseolak Ashoona was an artist whose drawings and prints portrayed the legends and lifestyles of the Inuit people, as well as some of Inuit art’s first autobiographical drawings.

Jennie Kidd Trout was the first licensed female physician in Canada who put all her efforts and money into making a new women’s medical college.

L.M. Montgomery was a renowned author famous for her feminist ideas that were rendered into novels like Anne of Green Gables books lent literary cred to Prince Edward Island.

Emily Carr helped the one who introduced Modernist and Post-Impressionist painting to Canada, promoting people who were battling the environmental impact of industrialization on Canada’s West Coast.

Laura Secord was a brave soldier who walked 20 miles to inform British troops of a planned American attack. She laid the path to a military victory that helped Canada emerge as a force in its own right.

Agnes Macphail was the first woman elected to the Canadian House of Commons and a staunch advocate for women and girls in the criminal justice system.

Barbara Frum was a powerful journalist responsible for a gloriously uncompromising interview with Margaret Thatcher.