Taking the Lead: A Woman’s Journey to Development

However, the indifference of many people to any organization introduced in the community is the result of the harassment and politicizing of early NGOs. Some organizations are politically-backed, thus dividing the community on the basis of the existing political powers in the province, namely the Governor Sato side or the Villarosa side.

The founding of BSEAKA belied the belief that only men could be members or officers of an organization. The association also established that BSEAKA is apolitical and focused on livelihood for women. In time, from the WID framework, BSEAKA might shift to the GAD framework, when they begin to question their position in their families and in society, and even the trend in the marketing of their goods.

As a whole BSEAKA is an organization with much potential in uplifting the situation of their members with respect not only to their livelihood, but also their position within their families and in society but also women’s position in the society by encouraging them to include women’s issues in their programs, like VAWC and Gender Sensitivity Training (GST).) As such, BSEAKA could be a vehicle in women’s advocacy in the near future.

Post Script

BSEAKA Today

It has been almost two months since my last interview with Mrs. Gomez. On our last conversation, she seemed already pessimistic on the situation of the organization, saying that majority of the members were still poor and barely make ends meet.

In March 3, 2009, I went to see her to share my findings on their organization and also to ask about the assessment they made two weeks ago. “Many of us are still poor, yet there is an awareness,” she says smiling. Mrs. Gomez says that money is really important, but what is important by joining the organization is the realization that they too have rights and the government has responsibilities to the people. She even tells me that one of the members used to be a verbally abused wife, especially when the husband was drunk. But when the woman joined the association, she no longer tolerated her husband’s abuses, telling him that she already knows her rights and she can sue him. Now, even when drunk (which is now very seldom), the husband does not utter a word against her. This, she owes to what she learned during the series of GST (Gender Sensitivity Training) I conducted, as Mrs. Gomez tells me. By opening the association to more members, access to loan is no longer their flagship program, instead it is protection, because by becoming a member a woman is protected by the members from abuses. Hence Filipino values of “pagtutulungan at pagkakaisa” (unity and cooperation) are very much alive in the association. Members are also beginning to raise questions on their status at home and in the community. Thus, they are now in the onset of understanding their triple roles: productive, reproductive and in the community works. In time, not only their practical needs can be addressed but also their strategic needs which is very essential to achieve empowerment. After six years of existence, BSEAKA is beginning to achieve conscientization through which they can start working towards positive changes in their status both at home and the society

The journey of BSEAKA continues…the struggle of grassroots women to recognize their contributions to society continues… on and on…until a just and equal position of men and women, class and race is achieved towards a better society.