Perspective

Rowena V. Guanzon

April 24, 2007

Where is Luisa Posa?

I had the shivers when a friend told me that Luisa “Luing” Posa was abducted in Oton, Iloilo on  April  12, 2007  together with a companion who is a member of SELDA, an organization that works for the rights of political detainees.  It is the year 2007, twenty years after the EDSA Revolution, and that twenty years should have been more than enough time for democracy to fully work.  Luisa Posa’s abduction has absolutely no justification and is a violation of her human rights.  It also gives us citizens a feeling of insecurity when a democratic system of government is supposed to be protecting all persons’ human rights and yet the law enforcement agencies are washing their hands on this issue.

Luisa Posa was arrested and detained for about six years during Martial Law and escaped her guards.  Before my father Judge Sixto R. Guanzon transferred to the Regional Trial Court of Bacolod, he was presiding judge in a sala in Iloilo City, where he was in good company with Judge Tito Gustilo and  the late Judge Felino Garcia, Sr. A few years after Luisa Posa  escaped from her captors, she was accused of illegal possession of firearms and the case was raffled to Judge Sixto Guanzon. I was told that when it was announced that the case was to be heard in Judge Guanzon’s sala, the human rights lawyers in the courtroom clapped.

Luisa was arrested inside the house of an acquaintance of hers whom she was visiting, and the “evidence” was taken from that house.  When the firearm was going to be introduced as evidence by the prosecution, Judge Guanzon denied its admissibility on the ground that the firearm was allegedly taken by the police from the house which was not owned or rented by Luisa Posa.  Judge Guanzon transferred to Bacolod City, but that case was eventually dismissed.  When Judge Guanzon turned 80 two years ago, we gave him a party in L’Fisher Hotel, and Luisa Posa, together with her daughter who is now a law graduate, attended.

Luisa Posa, who was legendary in her youth, was a subject matter in our many dinner conversations at home.  We admire women like her who, against many odds, have succeeded in moving on with their lives and work for the betterment of other people’s lives. Luing has a degree in Education (cum laude) from Central Philippine University and is a mother of three. To date, the police or the military has no clue as to who abducted her, but friends of Luing strongly suspect that it was  the military that  abducted her.  The military points a finger at the New People’s Army, who has denied the abduction.

This is not the tenth or 20^th abduction that occurred in the last five years.  Hundreds of activists have disappeared, and it is worrisome that the military is very quiet about it.  If it was not the military who abducted Luisa Posa and her male companion, the least that they could do is look for her. The least that we all could do is ask where she is, to pressure the police and the military to find her. If we remain quiet, these people will be emboldened to abduct activists and journalists.  We cannot accept a democratic governance where our fellow human beings disappear and none of the agencies of government can be held accountable for finding her.

Of the politicians in Regional 6, only Congressman Arthur Defensor has condemned the abduction. I haven’t heard that the National Bureau of Investigation is making an effort to locate Luisa Posa, and it is an agency of the government that has access to information and “intelligence reports.”

While Luisa and her family of Luing suffer and those of us who care are helpless, the politicians continue to court the votes of the Ilonggos, unmindful of the abduction of Luisa and her companion, as if it were the most ordinary thing.

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On 16 July 2007, Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno and the Supreme Court convened a national summit on the killings and disappearances of activists and other persons.

Among the recommendations is for the Commission on Human Rights to have power of prosecution and not merely investigation. The Chairperson of the Commissionon Human Rights in the Philippines is Dr. PUrificacion Valera-Quisumbing, former professor of law in the University of the Philippines, formerly with Unicef Bangkok. Her husband is Justice of the Supreme Court, Leonardo A Quisumbing

One cannot go to India without seeing one of the wonders of the world – the Taj Mahal, translated as “crown palace.” India, with about 13 billion people, and about One Million of them live in Agra, the city of the Taj Mahal, is not only well –known for this monument, but notably, for having a Rule of law. That is why women’s human rights lawyers recently went to India, but the Taj Mahal was a side trip.

The Supreme Court of India is way ahead of other Supreme Courts in Asia in the use of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women or the CEDAW, which it used in the interpretation of a sexual harassment case entitled Vishaka vs. State of Rajahstan. This case involves the gang rape of a female worker. Although India at that time did not have a law on sexual harassment, the Supreme Court used the CEDAW and ruled that absent a domestic law, an international agreement such as the CEDAW must be applied.

The host and secretariat of the Asia Cause Lawyers Network this year is the Lawyers Collective Women’s Rights Initiative, with the eminent lawyer Indira Jaising, a Senior Advocate in the Supreme Court as their founder and Director. Indira Jaising has, for forty years, litigated most difficult cases including that of the Sikh Massacre, but recognizes that they have experienced many setbacks also. India Jaising is brilliant and is the most prominent women’s human rights lawyer in India, who mentors younger women lawyers, and is generous with her time and experience with her Asian colleagues.

Recently, through the efforts of the Lawyers Collective, India passed its Domestic Violence law which, like the Philippines, protects women only. Interestingly, in Thailand, the Domestic Violence law was passed only after the coup d’etat, when for many years it was hibernating in their legislature. The Asia Cause Lawyers Network will exchange challenges, problems, experience and strategies, and our lessons and experiences with the judicial implementation of our Anti-Violence Against Women and their Children Act or Republic Act No. 9262 will be valuable not only to Filipino women’s human rights lawyers and advocates but to our sisters in Asia as well.

But let’s go back to the Taj Mahal. It was built around 1648 by the fifth mughal emperor Shahjahan to commemorate his bellowed wife Mumtaj who died while giving birth to her 14^th child. After giving birth to a 143th child, she does deserve the Taj Mahal.

The Taj is made of white non-porous marble. Its carvings of flowers – the rose and lotus – are made from single blocks of marble, using colored stones like lapis lazuli and cornelian for colors. It is said that it is most beautiful during a full moon, which happens about 5 times a month. Built by 20,000 workers, artisans and craftsmen, it took them 22 years to finish the grand monument which is symmetrical from any angle except for Shahjahan’s tomb, which was built after the Taj Mahal was finished and was not anticipated by the architect. Shahjahan went there every Friday to lay a crown of pearls on his wife’s tomb, but he died 8 years after it was finished.

Depressed for years because of his wife’s death, Shahjahan wanted to build his own monument, but his eldest son thought it was too extravagant and the money could be put to better use. Thus he imprisoned his father in Agra Fort and took over the affairs of the State.

The Taj Mahal is beautiful, and you can see its reflection in a pool in front of it. Built beside the Yamuna river which extends all the way to New Delhi, it has a double dome, which is why a voice inside can echo for 14 seconds.

Yet, outside the Taj Mahal, and even just outside your car window on the way there, many people of India are so poor. Shahjahan may not have known that in the future, people from all over the world would come to see his masterpiece. Although he was consumed by his love for his departed wife, he was blind to the poverty around him. It is said by some that he had the artisans maimed and blinded so they could not construct another, but that is undocumented. What is true for sure is that outside the Taj Mahal, the people’s hunger cannot be pacified by its beauty and magnificence.

OPINIONS

More than 500 lawyers and law students marched from the Integrated Bar of the Philippines building to the EDSA shrine this morning, in what can be the biggest mass action of lawyers against Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. If the Garci tapes did not unite the lawyers of all ages and from diverse political groups, Proclamation 1017 did it in one sweep. You name it, they were there – Jojo Binay, Butch Abad,Dean Pacifico Agabin of Lyceum College of Law, Dean Andy Bautista of FEU Law, Integrated Bar of the Philippines officers, Vicky Loanzon IBP President of Quezon City, Teofisto Guingona, Ernie Maceda, Jojo Binay, Rene Saguisag, lawyers from the Alternative Law Groups, Saligan, Akbayan, professors and students from other colleges of law. Some lawyers even brought their clients along.

We walked from the IBP Headquarters in Julia Vargas Street to the Edsa Shrine, marching on EDSA beside Megamall without any obstacle. My friends Professor Rowe Morales of U.P. and Prof. Vicky Victoria of San Beda Law and I decided to walk beside the UP College of Law students to protect them from arrests. While we were chanting “ Proclamation 017, ibasura!” while walking, bus drivers sympathized by honking their horns.

The police with shields barricaded the shrine. As good lawyers, our leaders negotiated pro forma. Then the pushing began, as the lawyers and other activists pushed their way in while the police tried to hold their ground with their shields. They had no truncheons nor guns, just shields. Jojo Binay was fuming mad as the police stopped him with their shields, and he kept pushing, his bodyguards around him. Saguisag looked like a bull who saw red. I saw Renato Constantino Jr. fall and angrily get up, and a young woman screamed and grabbed a shield and threw it on the ground. I saw others pushing the left flank and at the center, but the right flank was open. Then I ran.

When I ran to the right side, my friends from Gabriela shouted that I should go with someone, so I pulled Ana Cristal, Secretary General of Lawnet, to cross the barricade. Ana, in pearls, black suit and high heels, crossed without any challenge. But a single policeman blocked me with his shield. This is where chutzpah comes in. I shouted at him, “ be careful, I am a professor in the National Police College!” The man was stunned ( I don’t think they are quite used to English speaking rallyists) and then a lawyer behind him grabbed the shield and threw it on the ground. I walked up the stairs of the shrine and into the open space as an officer came half running. And then I saw that it was my former Chief of Police when I was Mayor of Cadiz, now Colonel Romeo Abaring, calling, “maam!.” Instead of thanking him which I should have done, I said, “ ano ba yan, Abaring.” If you see him, please tell him that I do appreciate what he has done. He probably thought I was in danger from one young policeman who was about my height, who obviously looked scared that he would have to push me back if I didn’t stop. Well I was not going to stop, and it was a blessing that he stood there, immobilized, until someone grabbed his shield and solved his problem.

The police barricade now broken, the others conquered the shrine without any challenge, and the police had to form their line at the back. There were more than 500 of us, and only about 60 policemen. Someone announced that a policeman lost his radio and could someone please return it if it is found because it is government property. Col. Abaring approached me to ask how many minutes would our program be and I introduced him to Atty. Joel Cadiz, the IBP President. Our program lasted more than 30 minutes, but the police, now relaxed, stood on the side, looking relieved that they didn’t have to wrestle with the English speaking, fierce looking, dignified looking lawyers, men and women all. Half of the rallyists were in court attire, in barong or suits. Ana Cristal said that the police was mesmerized by her South Sea pearls so she was able to cross the barricade unchallenged.

Before our program was finished GMA had lifted Proclamation. Ending the program with the song “Bayan ko,” the lawyers fell in line and trooped back to the IBP building, taking the street along Robinson’s Galleria. Atty. Sandy Colonel, whose husband is the PNP Provincial Director of Iloilo, went to the police line and said thank you to the commanding officer, but Col. Abaring was nowhere.

Lawyers have reclaimed EDSA Shrine for the people. Whether or not GMA lifted her Proclamation 1017, civil disobedience will continue. Even as I write, students and professors of the University of the Philippines are rallying behind the Oblation, condemning GMA and demanding her resignation.

On March 8, the women from all political groups will unite to celebrate International Women’s Day. Having had practice in the art of intimidating police officers with pearls and the English language, women lawyers and their clients are all set and ready to go.

What national emergency?

We survived Martial Law, but ironically, on the 20th anniversary of People Power in EDSA, our freedom is once again being threatened. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo issued Proclamation No. 1017 on Feb. 24, 2006,using as factual basis the conspiracy of extreme left and extreme right to bring down the duly constituted government, recklessly magnified by certain segments of national media. Her legal basis is her power to call out the Armed Forces as commander in chief under Article VII section 18 and that a state of national emergency exits, using Article XII Section 17.

But the only national emergency that the people know, especially those in the provinces, is the one that GMA created through her Proclamation No. 1017. She blames the opposition for political instability which negatively affects the economy, without seeing that the problem is right in her own yard.

It does not take a genius to see that the targets of the Proclamation are the leftists, the media, and businesses that are unfriendly to the GMA administration. Within 48 hours, Bayan Muna’s Representative Crispin Beltran was arrested, and the chase is still on to capture Satur Ocampo, and probably Liza Maza. Arrests of some military or former military officers were also announced, though we have no clear information as to the charges and the developments after their arrests.

When asked on radio about what the Proclamation means in terms of arrests without warrants, I heard Department of Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez say on the radio that even without this Proclamation, the rule on warrantless arrests under the Rules of Court applies. However, he said that with this Proclamation, “with more reason” that warrantless arrests apply. I leave this to you, all the good lawyers out there, to comment on such an “a fortiori” reasoning.

Even my taxi driver on the way to the airport asked the obvious question – so if you don’t need it to arrest people without a warrant, why issue a Proclamation at all?

And he continued to say what millions believe – if they close down or interfere with the media, how will the people know what is the truth? Filipinos all over the country, from a small island to the taxi drivers in the streets of Metro Manila, have only the radio to listen to. As discerning listeners, they know what radio stations to listen to. Interference by the government in the operations of media establishments is, in effect, prior restraint, which is unconstitutional.

Let me quote Section 17 Article II of the Constitution – “In times of national emergency, when the public interest so requires, the State may, during the emergency and under reasonable terms prescribed by it, temporarily take over or direct the operation of any privately-owned public utility or business affected with public interest.” These businesses include not only the media but also transportation, fuel and electricity.

Who determines whether a state of national emergency exits, the GMA government itself? Whatever happened to the powers of Congress? And you call this a democratic government?

The government says that there are attempts from the left and from the right to create instability and topple the government of GMA. What is clear is that surveys show that 80 percent of the Filipinos do not want GMA to stay as president. Thousands have gone to the streets in the last three days to repeat the call for her to resign. But that is not a “national emergency” that warrants a declaration of a state of emergency. A declaration of a state of national emergency can only be done by Congress.

Furthermore, as the statement of alternative law groups emphasizes, in the case of Agan, Jr. vs. Piatco (2003), the Supreme Court defined “national emergency” to include threat from external aggression, calamities or national disasters, but not strikes “unless it is of such proportion that would paralyze government service.”

GMA invokes Section 18, Article VII and I quote: “The President shall be the Commander-in-Chief of all armed forces of the Philippines and whenever it becomes necessary, he may call out such armed forces to prevent or suppress lawless violence, invasion or rebellion. In case of invasion or rebellion, when the public safety requires it, he may, for a period not exceeding sixty days, suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus or place the Philippines or any part thereof under martial law. Within forty-eight hours from the proclamation of martial law or the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, the President shall submit a report in person or in writing to the Congress.

The Congress, voting jointly, by a vote of at least a majority of all its Members in regular or special session, may revoke such proclamation or suspension, which revocation shall not be set aside by the President. Upon the initiative of the President, the Congress may, in the same manner, extend such proclamation or suspension for a period to be determined by the Congress, if the invasion or rebellion shall persist and public safety requires it. XXX”

If GMA thinks there is lawless violence or rebellion, why hasn’t she suspended the Writ of Habeas Corpus or declared Martial Law? That is because she cannot do these two things without the approval of Congress. It is obvious, therefore, that this Proclamation No. 1017 is but a legal justification for a crackdown on those who oppose GMA.

The government has closed down The Tribune because Ninez Cacho Olivares, its editor, has long been a staunch critic of GMA. It cannot even cite a single seditious article of the Tribune. I am certain that some of the advisers of GMA know that their tactic will be shot down by the Supreme Court, but in the meantime, they would have been able to do what they want to do – cause a chilling effect on all citizens, arrest the leaders of the left, control the media, and control public utilities or businesses affected with pubic interest.

We are lucky that we have a Senate that will not take this sitting down. Alternative lawyers and the Integrated Bar of the Philippines will definitely go to the Supreme Court. We in the media cannot do less. We should not allow this government to stifle our freedom to write the truth and our freedom to express our opinion and criticize the government. If it takes another 20 years to continue fighting for these, so be it.*

Poverty and our “wowowee economy”

If the Wowowee stampede that killed 74 people including small children, all but two of them women, cannot move me from hibernation, I don’t know what can. It was heartbreaking, seeing all those people dead on television, and all because more than 30,000 of them were trying to vie for 300 raffle tickets of the popular television program. If I didn’t write about it sooner it was because I have been out of the country.

As soon as I heard the news I called my laundry woman, who often lined up for Wowowee in her free time. One day, manang Naty proudly reported to me that she won $20 in Wowowee for telling a joke that she could no longer remember. So when I read in the news that some elderly women who were classmates in a Sunday aerobics class were hurt, I immediately thought she was one of them. I was relieved when she came to the phone and told me that she was all dressed up to go with her daughter but her son told her not to go because there would be too many people and it might be dangerous for elderly people like her. Manang Naty, who is also an Ilongga, is 60 years old or so, and thinks that the television program should not be stopped because it helps a lot of people. Anybody could win in Wowowee, she said, and nobody leaves home empty handed. My heart sagged when she said this, because many other poor people must be thinking the same way. Our people are so poor they will brave all risk to be able to bring home a few kilos of rice for their families, and never mind the risk to their lives.

Manang Naty meant that it was unfortunate that people died, but the television program is still a good thing. In other words, she was saying that at least in Wowowee, the poor can get a chance for their lives to turn around if they are lucky. In real life, they just struggle to get by day to day. Better to line up for hours, even days, and risk their limbs and lives than stay home with nothing.

As in everyday life in this country, it is the women like manang Naty and children who are the most vulnerable. They are also the poorest of the poor. The government can kick and scream that it is unfair that it is being blamed for everything including the stampede, but it cannot deny that more than one-third of our people are poor. They are so poor that they can not put three meals a day on the table and send their children to public schools. They are so poor that Wowowee was, for them, the easiest ticket to their dreams of a million pesos, a tricycle, a house, some dollars or a few thousands of pesos, or at least, a few kilos of rice for the day. So they camped out there for days, and lined up in thousands.

The parallel is striking. We also have a “ Wowowee economy,” as one friend calls it. Our government remains inept at solving the poverty problem, and instead of getting to the core of the problem, shells out 500 million for electrification, millions for rice, 500 millioon for this and 400 million for that, as if that will solve the problem.

Our people cannot find jobs here so they line up for months and get into debt just to be able to work abroad, because there lies their chance at a future for their children. What the government calls “deployment “ of overseas workers has become a strategy for survival of the country. We have to date, around 981,000 Filipinos abroad and our government wants to hit a million by this year or next. Instead of ensuring jobs here, our government plans to solve the poverty problem by having a million Filipinos working abroad.

Note: 300 Filipinos are in Vietnam, and nakakainggit ang sipag at tiyaga ng Vietnamese. I was there for a seminar on trafficking of children, sponsored by the Inter-Parliamentarians Union. 13 countries were represented from the asia-pacific region, and 55 parliamentarians and their staff attended.

Bago judge allows taking of Recto child

Actress Plinky Recto disclosed on national television yesterday that her 15-month-old son was taken by her former lover from her condominium yesterday morning.
Recto said her former partner, whom she did not name on television, had an order from the Regional Trial Court of Bago City in Negros Occidental.
The Bago court had granted the man temporary custody of the child and also gave a 30-day protection order barring Recto from going near him, according to court documents Recto showed to reporters in Manila.
Recto’s lawyer, Rowena Guanzon, said a petition for custody with prayers for temporary protection had been filed by a Negrense lawyer against her client.
Bago RTC judge Henry Trocino had issued a Temporary Protection Order allowing the lawyer to take custody of the child, she said.
Guanzon, however, said the judge was misinformed and cannot use Republic Act 9262, the Anti-Violence Against Women and Children Act of 2004, against her client.
Guanzon said the filing of a petition against her client in Bago was forum-shopping, since Recto had already filed a petition for a protection order before the Mandaluyong RTC against her former partner, citing RA 9262 earlier.

Attempts by the STAR to reach the lawyer were not successful up to press time yesterday.*
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Chief Justice Davide Jr.’s legacy

December 19 was Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, Jr.’s last day in the Supreme Court, a Chief Justice whose court has been called an “activist court” by some, and short of “meddling” by others. He is not spared from political criticism because his Court upheld that the presidency of Gloria Arroyo was valid due to the resignation or abandonment by former President Joseph Estrada. He is also the only Chief Justice who had an impeachment complaint filed against him.
He served as Chief Justice since 1999, and although he may not have written many brilliant decisions, his record in the administration of justice has a prominent place in the history of the Supreme Court. In the Asian region, the Davide Court is looked upon as a good example. Proof of his leadership in this area is the recent international conference on judicial reform which was held in Manila.
Chief Justice Davide Jr. leads other Chief Justices before him in the area of gender and women’s rights. Although during his term the Supreme Court has decisions that perpetuated myths about rape and stereotyped women’s roles, the Chief Justice was quick to admit during the launch of our book, Engendering the Philippine Judiciary, that he knows that our book contains a critique of decisions, but the judiciary must be open to criticism. During our book launch on December 15 at the Manila Hotel, he said that he thanks both his friends and his detractors because they have all contributed to his journey.
The Chief Justice wrote some decisions that were trailblazing in the area of women’s rights. Among these is his dissenting opinion in People vs. Salarza (1997), where a Caucasian woman sued her boyfriend’s friend for raping her while she was asleep. The Supreme Court, through Justice Josue Bellosillo, held that there was no rape because the woman woke up during the carnal knowledge and thought that the man was her boyfriend. Chief Justice Davide Jr. dissented and wrote that what is important is that the woman must have had informed consent to the sexual intercourse, which was lacking in that case. Another is his dissenting opinion in People vs. Genosa, where the Supreme Court held that battered wife syndrome is a mitigating circumstance that lowers the penalty by two degrees but cannot acquit the accused. Chief Justice Davide Jr. is vindicated by Republic Act No. 9262 or the Anti-Violence Against Women and their Children Act, which provides that battered woman syndrome is a justifying circumstance notwithstanding that any of the elements of self defense may be lacking.
His dissenting opinion in Salarza will hopefully be the majority opinion one day, as there is an increasing number of rape of women and girls while they were drugged or drunk, or asleep. We have handled three cases of U.P. female students who were either drugged or drunk when they were raped.
Chief Justice Davide Jr. created the Committee on Gender Responsiveness of the Judiciary, as part of the reforms during his term. Gender sensitivity training of judges are continuing, although there are still many judges who are insensitive to gender and do not believe that this is indispensable to the administration of justice. Our book, Engendering the Philippine Judiciary, which will be published by the U.P. Center for Women’s Studies Foundation and the United Nations Development Fund for Women-Bangkok, aims to help raise the awareness of judges on gender by teaching them gender analyses as a tool, and to use the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in their decisions. In other jurisdictions such as India and Hongkong, the courts use the CEDAW to interpret domestic laws or to fill gaps in the law.
The Chief Justice was a supporter of the Gender Justice Awards and was the keynote speaker during the Supreme Court sponsored launch of the book. Bacolod’s Regional Trial Court Judges Edgar Garvilles and Edgardo delos Santos and their decisions which won recognition from the Gender Justice Awards are featured in the book, as well as digest of Supreme Court decisions on violence against women that will be helpful to judges, prosecutors and women’s rights advocates.
Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, Jr. was, of course, not perfect. But in the area of gender and women’s rights, we give him more than a passing grade. The contributions to gender and women’s rights of the Davide Court will be the subject matter of another book which will be published by the U.P. Center for Women’s Studies Foundation and The Asia Foundation in March 2006.
To Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, Jr., our fond farewell.*

Perspective
with Rowena V. Guanzon

OPINIONS

Women hold up half the sky

BEIJING – “Women hold up half the sky,” and this could not be more true in China, where 6 billion of 13 billion people are women. Yet, women all over the world do not have equal power with men in political, economic and social life, and that includes China, where one-fourth of the population of the entire world lives. Whether in a socialist state like China or a democracy like the Philippines, women are treated in law and by institutions, society, and within the family and relationships as subordinate to men. And this has to change.

As you read this, I have just finished a seminar on gender and law in Beijing, where I, Anna Wu, former head of the Equal Employment and Opportunity Commission of Hongkong, Kieren Fritzpatrick of Asia Pacific Forum on Human Rights (Australia), American-Korean Hyeon-Ju Rho from Columbia Law School and Rangita de Silva of Spanggenberg Goup in the U.S. are resource persons. Together with Chinese women’s rights advocates, which included about five men, we discussed the challenge of public interest litigation in China and other countries, and China’s amended Law on Protection of Women’s Rights and Interest. Unlike the Philippines, which has a growing number of women’s rights and human rights organizations, China’s largest women’s organization is the Women’s Federation, which is a government entity. To bridge the lack of groups providing legal aid for women, lawyers based in universities are working in the area of women’s rights.

There are about 30,000 women lawyers in China, 4,000 of them in Beijing, but only a few are engaged in the legal aid work for women. Thanks to the NGO Legal Aid of Peking University Women’s Law Studies and Legal Aid Center which was started only a couple of years ago, poor women have help in getting access to justice. They also have a group called Women Watch in Beijing, which is also based in Peking University. Since it is impossible to provide legal aid to most poor women in China, Women Watch is doing strategic litigation, using cases which have a high impact on changing rules, law, and village governance. They are focusing on rural women, who are the most disempowered because of their low economic status, low level of education, and distance from government centers.

The experience of women’s rights advocates (and these include a few good men) all over the world is that change will not come without struggle. This is also the experience of advocates in the Philippines, who worked for nine years before the Anti-Rape Act of 1997. Politics and law-making are dominated by men so that the male perspective in writing law and government rules dominate and rule women’s lives, including in the courts.

Even the interpretation of what is correct behavior for women are men’s standards, hence the double standard in our society. Men and women who subscribe to this double standard expect women to be chaste, but they have no problem with men committing infidelity. It is the men who relegated women to the home and the private sphere, so that they can have the public sphere, the most powerful of which are politics and business. If you think this is a discourse that pits women against men, your view is somewhat correct, because men, as a group, will resist the erosion of their power in the home, in society and in politics.

But the more enlightened view is that women are at disadvantage and it is not right and it is not fair that women do not have equality with men. To eliminate this inequality, law and rules have to change, and society must change the way it views women, and that includes changing tradition and culture that place women in subordinate status with men.

In China or in the Philippines, the work is enormous for women’s rights advocates. Enlightened men should join us, if they want their daughters, sisters, nieces and granddaughters to be free from inequality and the dominance of patriarchy.*

By Rowena Guanzon

Visayan Daily Star (www.visayandailystar.com)

November 15, 2005

Tame us or slay us?

IF Gloria Macapagal Arroyo would have her way, we in the media would all be her propagandists, writing only about the good things she has done without the bad, dancing to her every tune and singing halleluiah. In the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkasters ng Pilipinas conference in Baguio last week, she dished out her low regard for the media as “becoming a national malaise and a hindrance to development rather than a solution to our problems.”GMA, a former professor in Economics, wants to lecture all of us on her theory of the role of the media in a democratic society.No one who has occupied Malacanang has been as antagonistic as she is to the media, and her speech in Baguio has just removed all doubts about the way she regards the media as an institution that a president must tame or slay.

Coming from no less that the one who lives in Malacanang, how else can be interpret her words other than a threat to our freedom of expression?

Because they must write or speak the truth, those in the media will often be at odds with those who in power, a president especially.In fact, it is the mark of a free media when it is at odds with the powers that be. That is its indispensable function in a free society.While some in the media can be bought or co-opted, they are answerable to the law, their peers and their conscience, but is not an argument for muffling the press, or stifling the people’s right to information.I thought it was elementary that one must not shoot the messenger.

GMA regards the “Fourth Estate” as an obstacle, an enemy of development, a national malaise. She might as well have said that the reason we remain an underdeveloped country is because we have too much freedom of the press.She would have us write only the good about what her government is doing, as if by doing so investors will come in droves, and that is all that a president needs for her economic plan to prosper.It is not the Philippine media that is the reason why investors are staying away; it is the corruption from the lowest to the highest levels of government (and the First Gentleman has not been spared of this accusation) and the high cost of doing business in the Philippines.It is not the media who caused the political instability in the country; it is GMA and her loyal henchmen who did, who used everything in their power to stop the impeachment proceedings against her.

I don’t know who gave her the idea that it is the media’s role to give solutions to the country’s problems in the first place.That is her job, not ours.We are no less patriotic if we write about the government’s ills, or less intelligent because we write that the new Value Added Tax will burden the poor.

Our job is to write the TRUTH and analyzes the truth.If the truth is that this government stinks, the media has no duty to deodorize it. We are unanswerable to those who read or listen to us, who can very well tell true from false, and right from wrong.The Filipino reader and listener knows which paper she or he wants to read, what radio station, anchor person or reporter she or he wants to listen to.No one powerful person is going to tell us what to stay or what to write about, or she might as well try closing down the newspapers, radio, television stations, and the blogs.