PREDA Celebrates Women’s Month through Advocacies and Awareness Raising Efforts

PREDA Celebrates Women’s Month through Advocacies and Awareness Raising Efforts

The month of March is the celebration of women all over the world. It has been celebrated since 1988, through Proclamation No. 224 signed by then-President Corazon C. Aquino, declaring the first week of March of every year as women’s week and March 8, 1988, and every year thereafter as Women’s Rights and International Peace Day.” The proclamation recognized Filipino women’s contribution to the struggle for national independence, civil liberties, equality and human rights. It also affirmed the country’s solidarity with the United Nations.

Instead of opting for meaningless celebrations, Preda implemented a combination of face-to-face and online learning interventions for women and girls as well as capacity-building interventions for stakeholders. Preda recognizes that there is still an urgent need for women and girls, especially those who are poor, to be empowered through education and heightened awareness of their rights and the laws that are meant to protect them. There is also an imperative demand for duty-bearers to fulfill their obligations to women and girls’ protection. This is of vital importance because of the prevailing situation in the country where 8 in 10 Filipino children suffered some form of violence in their lifetime (Council for the Welfare of Children and UNICEF, 2016); 1 in 4 Filipino women experienced physical, emotional or sexual violence by their husband or partner (Philippine Statistics Authority, 2017); the Philippines ranking no. 12th among countries with the highest incidence of modern-day slavery in the entire Asia Pacific with more than 700,000 cases of trafficking annually (Global Slavery Index, 2018); and the country being dubbed as the global epicenter of the live-stream sexual abuse trade where 1 in every 5 Filipino children are vulnerable to online sexual exploitation (Unicef, 2016).

The situation is further aggravated due to the pandemic. But while COVID remains a threat to children, the pandemic of gender-based violence is more alarming. There is indeed an imperative demand to strengthen community-based interventions for the prevention of gender-based violence against women and girls alongside protecting and empowering the victims.

Now that the restrictions have eased, Preda continued its community-based preventive education project in the grassroots areas, in particular, the indigenous peoples’ communities around Zambales and Bataan. Hundreds of Aeta women and girls are oriented through daily public seminars about their rights and responsibilities with sessions on the prevention of early or forced marriages and the new law raising the age of sexual consent to 16. Aeta tribal leaders and male partners are also informed about various laws protecting women and children and the protocols to follow in cases of gender-based violence. They too were reminded of their responsibilities not to partake nor to facilitate the long-time practice of amicable settlements or early marriages as these acts are now punishable by law. Some members of the flagship poverty alleviation program, Pantawid Pamilya, were also oriented on their right to protection and empowerment. These seminars are done in cooperation with the Department of Social Welfare and Development and the barangays (village) leaders.

Online Advocacies for women and child protection are continuously done maximizing Preda’s online presence on its website and social media sites such as Facebook with more than 12 thousand followers. Preda articles and news reports from around the world are posted daily to raise awareness of the plight of women and children as well as stories of hope and inspiration.

There were also online webinars conducted by Preda for women and child protection and empowerment attended by the Department of Education (DepEd) Personnel, Learners and Parents such as the online learning sessions on the DepEd Child Protection Policy, Children’s Rights and Responsibilities and Prevention of Bullying held on 24 March via Microsoft Teams with more than 300 participants that included learners, parents, teachers, administrators and even invited guests from other schools.

On 18 March, another online capacity-building intervention on Gender and Development, Women and Children’s Rights was conducted for students, teachers and parents of Castillejos National Highschool in Zambales reaching more than 190 participants.

On 25 March, a webinar on Women and Children Rights, Laws and Reporting Protocols was implemented for 63 participants composed of DepEd Teachers and student leaders from Mabayuan Highschool, Olongapo City.

In all these webinars and learning interventions, Preda emphasized that laws meant to protect women and children will only become meaningful and relevant if duty-bearers will enforce them if rights holders will exercise their rights, and if there is accountability demanded among perpetrators.

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