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She was therefore a big deal. As well as gender symbolic.

Photo by Adrian Wyld / THE CANADIAN PRESS

The senators said Wilson-Raybould’s tenure as justice minister and the government’s top lawyer will leave “a lasting mark in history” that will inspire future generations of indigenous people, adding that she “displayed personal strength of character, integrity and dedication to modernize the justice system and work towards reconciliation.”

They said while Wilson-Raybould’s departure does not threaten the “promise and process of reconciliation,” it is a reminder “of the distance we have yet to go and the challenges we have yet to overcome.”

This is one of the last things Prime Minister Justin Trudeau needs, of course, in that a pack of largely his own senators are giving him grief as well as more oxygen to a scandal he is trying so desperately to smother.

But, then again, he is the author of his own misfortune, setting it off by publicly stating that Wilson-Raybould’s presence in cabinet was testimony to the fact she was content with his shuffling her aside by knocking her down a goodly number of rungs on his cabinet’s pecking order.

But she showed him how unbelievably content she was by resigning the very next day.

And so began one mighty fine soap opera.

It’s going to be a longish haul.

As it stands today, there are two probes into whether Trudeau, his inner circle and his bureaucratic supporters in the Privy Council had put pressure on Wilson-Raybould when she held the big portfolio to have her convince the Crown prosecutor to nix the criminal trial of SNC-Lavalin on corruption charges and settle the matter out of court, thereby allowing the Quebec-based construction monolith to continue bidding on Canadian mega-contracts.