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| March 8: International Women’s Day |
Honouring women human rights defenders who dedicated their lives to promote justice and equality for women
2006 marks 20th anniversary of Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD).
From 38 women leaders who founded the network in 1986, APWLD now has close to 150 individual and organisation members in 23 countries of the Asia Pacific region.
APWLD has been recognised as “the leading, very strong and dynamic feminist network of organisations and individuals in the region” by the 2005 External Evaluation. It would not have been possible without contribution of our members – courageous women human rights defenders who dedicate their lives to promoting women’s rights and fighting the injustice and discrimination against women.
On its 20th anniversary, APWLD is paying tribute and honouring its members, who are no longer with us, in recognition of their contribution to advancement of women’s rights in their countries and in the region.
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March 8 . . .
GABRIELA HOLDS NATIONWIDE PROTEST AGAINST ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE
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March 8, 2005
GABRIELA, the largest women’s organization in the Philippines celebrated International Women’s Day through a nationally coordinated hunger march mobilizing thousands of women from various sectors. Its chapters all over the country, from Manila to the different provinces in Luzon, Vizayas and Mindanao held various activities highlighting women’s protest against the worsening conditions of Filipinas under the leadership of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
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In Manila, the day started with a symbolic women’s “Harana sa Kababaihan” lead by GABRIELA’s cultural group, Sining Lila, where women’s songs were rendered to chosen areas as a tribute for the day’s commemoration. At 12 noon, more than five thousand women converged at Welcome Rotonda where GABRIELA-National Capital Region hosted a program. At 3 PM, the women marched to Mendiola for the main program and cultural night.
This year’s International Women’s Day is centered on the worsening economic crisis coupled by the continued political repression. The women protested against high prices, the looming increase in Value Added Tax (VAT) and the intensifying political violence particularly in Southern Tagalog.
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The highlight of the program was the Extra Challenge ng Kababaihan, Gloria, Kaya Mo Ba ‘To ? which was patterned from two popular reality shows on television. The said presentation was a satire on the lives of Filipino people where everyday survival is really an extra challenge. One example of challenge is how could the people seek medical treatment with a meager 33 centavos per day as health budget.
GABRIELA Secretary General Emmi de Jesus stated there is indeed a big reason for women to be protesting this day because of the worsening condition of women and their families. “We mark this day as a national day of protest of women against Mrs. Arroyo for making women’s lives more miserable. It is no wonder that majority of women now say, Gloria, Pahirap sa Masa, Patalsikin Na!”
De Jesus, however, was quick to add that the strength and unity of women especially in times of crisis is admirable. “Our history shows that women become more united and vigilant when they face crisis and the situation endangers their families especially their children. And Mrs. Arroyo must better beware of this lest she will be swept away from office by the people, with women at the forefront”.
The day’s activity ended with torch lighting during the cultural night at Mendiola where noted mainstream and alternative artists and cultural groups performed. |
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- 1857 - one of the first organized actions
by working women anywhere in the world. Hundreds of
women garment and textile workers went on strike in
New York City, in protest of low wages, long working
hours and inhumane working conditions. Police violently
attacked the workers, many were injured, many were
arrested.
- 1908 - "Bread and Roses" was chanted as a
campaign slogan by some 30,000 women workers who took
to the streets of New York. Bread symbolizing economic
security and roses a better quality of life. The women
workers were calling for shorter work hours, better
pay, voting rights and an end to child labour. Within
a few years of their "Bread and Roses" campaign, the
first women's labour union in America was organized.
- 1911 - working women from Germany, Austria,
Denmark and other European countries held strikes
and marches. Russian revolutionary and feminist Aleksandra
Kollantai, who helped organized the event, described
it as "one seething trembling sea of women." Aleksandra
Kollantai and Klara Zetkin, a German socialist, proposed
that there should be international solidarity among
exploited women workers. Thus, these women have been
known to be the founders of International Women's
Day (IWD).
- 1914 - women opposing war staged mass protests
all over Europe. World War I was waged not without
dissent from women. They were organizing and demonstrating
for peace, across cultural divides. This set-off series
of powerful marches and demonstrations all throughout,
with women from both sides of the war participating
in solidarity.
- 1917 - The "Bread and Peace" strike led by
the Russian women in St. Petersburg. The IWD strike,
which was participated in by Klara Zetkin and Aleksandra
Kollantai, merged with riots that had spread throughout
the city between March 8-12. This later became known
as "The February Revolution" which forced the authoritarian
rule of Czar Nicholas II to end. (Russia switched
from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar in 1918,
which moved the dates of the February revolution [Feb.
24-28, old style] to March.)
March 8 - "The Heroic Woman Worker" is commemorated
and celebrated on this day, as Aleksandra Kollantai, as
a minister in the first Soviet government, persuaded Lenin
to make March 8 as an official communist holiday.
The history of March 8 as the International Women's Day is rooted on the
movement for women's rights and peace. IWD was commemorated in the United
States during the 1910s and 1920s, but then dwindled. It was revived during
the women's movement in the 1960s, but without its socialist associations.
In 1975, the United Nations began sponsoring International Women's Day.
The women's movements in the Asia Pacific region have long joined in the
celebration of the IWD. While equal rights, quality of life and peace have
been consistently upheld as the demands of women, there were also other
issues highlighted which are urgent and particular to the lives and context
of women in the region. The use of rape by the state as a weapon of war has
ravaged the lives of hundreds of women living in armed conflict situations. The aggressive war on terrorism has heightened violence against communities and organisations in the list of suspected terrorists, causing insecurity and death among
women human rights defenders. The take-over of multinational corporations over land, farms, vegetable gardens, kitchen, has pushed rural women out of their source of power and control over their livelihoods and survival. The intensifying fundamentalisms have seen the use of women and their bodies as tools of propaganda for different religion and ethnicity, entrenching masculine power over women and their communities.
However, over the years, the tradition of the IWD has slowly been co-opted
by the governments. March 8 as the International Women's Day is
increasingly becoming an occasion for UN-sponsored international conferences, national
government-sponsored festivities and grand receptions. While these help
popularise the significance of March 8, that is to highlight the urgent
issues of women, and a space to create international solidarity among women,
these government grand events overshadow the genuine spirit of political
activism of IWD.
March 8, as the International Women's Day, has the tradition of protest and
activism. Let us keep it alive. Let us not allow this day to be a
government-sponsored celebration led by women who enjoy privileges of power
and wealth, while majority of women continue to live a life of poverty,
exploitation and oppression. Let them not speak for us. Let them not obscure our fight for change.
On March 8, and the days thereafter on this women's month, let us take to the streets, as our sisters did generations ago. Let our own voices be heard today!
The women's month is also a month of celebration. Let us celebrate international solidarity among women workers, migrants, indigenous, hilltribes, rural poor, Dalits, peasants, fisher and agricultural workers, sex workers, trafficked girls and other marginalized women. Let us celebrate our strength, and our spirit, as we persist with our mission of giving birth to a just, humane, nurturing society for both women and men.
March 8, 2004
Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development
(APWLD) |
| International Women's Day actions |
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