Page 9 - Empowerment and Protection - The Philippines

E3VELOPMENT
interconnected insecurities
Through my work [as an advocate and Congresswoman], I have begun seeing the factors affecting society, the many dimensions of true poverty. Many of my old assumptions about poverty changed. I began to learn more about the root causes of poverty in the Philippines. People had no education, many were marginalised, and the two were interconnected. Through the work I got to see how these realities were affected by political decisions, even global trends. All were connected with the various processes and systems, even the business world. There were connections to these sources of insecurities.
”Many of my old assumptions about poverty changed.”
Poverty is a manifestation of the complex problems faced by the poor. Then, once poor, they spawn more problems that manifest in further social ills. This population has no access to opportunities
or any enabling mechanisms with which to change their fate. The poor will continue to have more children, building pressure on our social infrastructure. This perpetuates the imbalance and
PhiliPPines
tHe AdVoCAte
Andrea Maria Patricia M. sarenas
Andrea Maria Patricia “Pat” M. sarenas prefers to be described as a retired grandmother who remains involved and noisy with her advocacy. “Pat” as she is simply known was a party list Congresswoman for the 11th and 12th Congress from 1998 to 2004. she continues to sit as Chair of the Philippine national nGo platform, the Caucus of development nGo networks (Code-nGo), and the Mindanao Coalition of development networks (MInCode). she is the only party list representative who championed the passage of three landmark laws in Congress covering the trafficking of persons, violence against women and children and support for single parents.
insecurity we continue to feel about society overall. There is too great a push to ‘unrich the rich,’ for society to take back some of the excess they now have; instead there should be a greater effort to ‘unpoor’ the poor, to concentrate more on uplifting them from their present condition.
I am also frustrated with the military protecting vested interests like businesses, particularly in the remote areas. But I am supportive of the ongoing efforts with security sector reform. We can see some results of this, but the fear of the military remains dominant. There is still a distance between security forces and the people. Ideally in a secure society, there should be no need for any marked police or military presence.
lessons in anti-trafficking and gender advocacy
Some of the insecurities we women had long faced were addressed through legal reform. We learned how difficult it was to work with the male-dominated legislature. The need for closer networking with like-minded NGOs became more pronounced. So I also got involved in organising NGO/CSO networks, both local and national.
As long as our work was guided by our coalition work, we persevered, even if it was a difficult struggle.
Aside from legislative work, we needed lobbying to get support in solving the insecurities we addressed. We lobbied and advocated and won victories by having sexual harassment declared a crime. We also undertook the further detailing
of Violence Against Women (VAW) laws, lessening the opportunity for the male-dominated judiciary to interpret these details by themselves. We basically made clear to them what the key definitions, issues and roles concerning women were.
Even within Congress, we began with defining
a common understanding of trafficking when
we worked on drafting and passing the Anti- Trafficking in Persons Act. We organised gender and development committees. We involved the rank and file of the House, to check and monitor the mainstreaming of gender concerns in legislation and even the processes within the legislature.
These internal groupings and mechanisms became the driving forces within the committees and
the House. In a microcosm of organising, we strengthened these groups until they knew the issue, they were educated and finally reached the
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