Burmese Women Leaders Learning from the Philippine Women's Movement
Joanna C. Castro, Initiatives for International Dialogue, 23 July 2003

Four women leaders from different ethnic states in Burma - Shan, Mon, Karen and Kachin - visited the Philippines last 6-16 October to participate in a political strategy exposure on Filipino women's movement.

The women -- Hseng Moon ( Shan Women's Action Network ), Tin Tin Nyo ( Burmese Women's Union), Paw Hset Ser ( Karen Women's Organization ) and Shirley Seng ( Kachin Women's Association) - toured civil society groups in the Philippines and met with several government officials in their brief stay in the country under the sponsordhip of the Initiatives for International Dialogue (IID) and the Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma (ALTSEAN-Burma).

"We believe that this 10-day exposure is useful to the advancement of women in Burma, especially now when we are already starting to voice out our own issues," Hseng Moon of SWAN said.

Until now, Burma has no independent women's organization. If any, most of them are operating outside the country which makes it difficult to reach the needs of the women who are living inside Burma.

There are organizations such as the National Committee for Women's Affairs in the Ministry of Social Welfare and Myanmar Maternal and Child Welfare Association controlled by the military junta. None of them, however, have been able to uplift the status of women in Burma. Domestic violence, rape, prostitution and trafficking of women are still rampant.

The four women visited Gabriela, an alliance of over a hundred women's organizations, institutes, desks and programs. The alliance, started in 1984 with only 42 women's groups, now has it base among women at the grassroots, the peasants, workers and urban poor, women from religious institutions, and students across the country. They also visited the women living in Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), a mountainous part of the Northern part of the Philippines. The region includes the city of Baguio and the provinces of Benguet, Ifugao, Mountain Province, Abra, and Kalinga Apayao.

The women also met the leaders and members of the Cordillera's People's Alliance (CPA) based in Baguio City. The alliance is a federation of indigenous peoples' organizations in the region, uniting the Cordillera's indigenous peoples in the defense of their ancestral domain and in their struggle for self-determination.
They also visited other women's organizations such as the Igorota Foundation Inc., Maryknoll Sisters Center for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation, Cordillera Women's Education and Resource Center and Innabuyog, the alliance of indigenous women's groups in CAR.

"We have learned a lot from the braveness of women in the Philippines. They know what they are doing. I am sure, after getting back to Burma, I will apply the strategies that they are using in their struggles," a Mon delegate said.

The topics discussed by the women of Burma and the Filipino women ranged from empowering women in political and social aspects through trainings and workshops, educating the indigenous people about their human rights, and the setting up of women centers and women organizations' financial sustainability.

In a mountainous trek to the Acupan Village in Itogon, a mining town in Benguet, the women delegates were able to meet some of the 400-member Acupan Upper Camps Community Livelihood Association, who at the time were barricading the portal leading to "Level 1500," the tunnel layer of the mountain closest to the surface where their village is situated. The miners said a contractor of a big mining corporation is planning to open it.

Furthermore, the activity did not only expose the women of Burma on how women in the Philippines are fighting for their human rights, but it has also fostered solidarity between them.

Filipino women leaders, politicians and advocates have also expressed their support to the strong women's movement of Burma, despite of the military government's strong opposition and suppression to operate inside the country.

Joining some two thousand signatories from all over the world, a number of Filipino women and men have signed the petition expressing disgust and anger over Burma's military regime's widespread use of rape as a weapon of war against Burma's minority peoples.

Several Filipino legislators have also signed the petition, among them Representatives Teodoro Locsin Jr, Liza Masa, Josefina Joson and Loretta Ann Rosales.
The petition, which was initiated by the Shan Women's Action Network and the Shan Human Rights Foundation, was a result of a recently published report, "Licence to Rape," documenting the rape cases of 173 women who were raped by members of the military in Burma.

The report has elicited international attention because of the women's claim that the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), the ruling military junta in Burma, has been using rape as a terror tactic in its anti-insurgency campaign against ethnic nationality rebels in the Shan State.