FemaleBattle.net

A Senate bill calling for an end to violence against women and children moved a step closer to becoming a law after the Senate passed it on third and final reading late Monday.

Senator Luisa Ejercito-Estrada, principal sponsor of Senate Bill No. 2723 and head of the committee on youth, women, and family relations, said the bill was an "embodiment of women's collective struggle for their human rights, finally ending the cycle of abuse committed against them and their children."

Senate Majority Floor Leader Francis Pangilinan said the approval of the bill, authored by Senator Loren Legarda, raised the issue of domestic violence to a "national societal concern that needs to be urgently addressed."

"It is ironic that in our society, women are usually seen as pillars of the household, yet in their own homes they are usually victims of violence," Pangilinan said in a statement.

The proposed law defines violence against women and children as any act or series or acts committed by any person against a woman who is his wife, former wife, or with whom the woman has or had dating relationship, or against a child, whether legitimate or illegitimate.

It defines violent acts as those that would "result in or is likely to result in physical, sexual, psychological harm or suffering or economic abuse, including threats of such acts, battery, assault coercion, harassment or arbitrary deprivation of liberty.

"Unlike similar provisions in the Revised Penal Code, the bill proposes "protection order" to prevent further acts of violence against the victim.

The bill also proposes mandatory programs and services for victims, including emergency shelter, gender-responsive counseling, free legal assistance for indigents, medical assistance and psychiatric care.

Citing "lamentable and troubling" statistics from the Women's Crisis Center, Legarda explained that the measure would plug the many loopholes in Philippine laws "that somehow abet the commission of crimes against women and children, including marital rape and incest.

"The vice presidential candidate of Fernando Poe Jr. stressed that women and children were not "sex toys" to play with. "Neither are they punching bags on which to bent one's rage over the flimsiest of excuses.

"Legarda then pointed out that the proposed act would recognize that a marriage was not a ride-all-you-can ticket to sexual gratification. "Although spouses have biological responsibilities toward one another.

The Supreme Court defined a battered woman as one "who is repeatedly subjected to any forceful physical or psychological behavior by a man in order to coerce her to do something he wants to do without concern for her rights."

Recently, the battered wife who killed her husband eight years ago, was spared by the Supreme Court from lethal injection. Marivic Genosa, 44, was released from the Bureau of Corrections after 4 years of being incarcerated. She was convicted and meted death penalty by the Ormoc Regional Trial Court in September 1998. Last month however, after a review of her case, the Supreme Court issued its landmark decision and ordered her release on parole because she had served the minimum six years imprisonment.

This is a legal breakthrough as the courts had finally recognized the 'battered woman syndrome'. The acceptance of this syndrome as a form of self-defense opened the door to the recognition by the courts of the latest developments in psychology and mental health. The decision of the Supreme Court sets a legal precedent and is a first in the history of Philippine jurisprudence.

The latest Social Weather Station survey says that about 2.16 million Filipino women, or 9% of women aged 18 and above, have experienced physical abuse with a majority saying that harm was inflicted by their partners, that is, their husbands, boyfriends and live-in partners.

The survey was conducted in November 2003 and was commissioned by two women's rights groups, the Kalakasan Foundation and the Women's Media Circle (WMC).

Battering and abuse occur not only in marriage. 89% of women in a non-married relationship have been physically harmed at least once by their boyfriends. SWS, Kalakasan and WMC said the problem continues because abusers are kept private. "Women victims of partner abuse continue to be judged and blamed for being a victim, that the violence is their fault, being naggers or continuing to stay in the relationship. And when they report the abuse and leave, they are blamed for breaking up the family," said Kalakasan executive director Kalayaan Pulido-Constantino.

According to the survey, the top four reasons why women did not report the abuse were: it is embarrassing; they don't know how and where to report; nothing would be done anyway, and it is too small a thing to bother about.

The specific acts of violence that came out in the survey were : threatening women with a deadly weapon like a gun or a knife (99%); verbal abuse (99%); physical abuse (98%); arming oneself to control women's actions (98%); preventing women from working (82%). This cut across area, socioeconomic class, gender and civil status.

The SWS survey also confirmed the need to immediately pass the "Anti-Violence Against Women and Children Act" pending in Congress. The act criminalizes violence against women and provides protection orders, states the role of the barangay in resolving domestic violence cases and mandates support services for victims.

Gabriela, in cooperation with advertising giant Ace Saatchi and Saatchi, will launch the Blow-A-Whistle Campaign to heighten public awareness against violence on women and children.

According to data gathered by Gabriela from the Philippine National Police, three women and nine children were raped in the country every day from January to September 2003.

Gabriela, however, said, these figures reflect only cases of those who dared to speak up about their plight. The group believes that many wives, girlfriends, employees, mothers and children chose or are forced not to say anything.

It aims to break the "culture of silence" about domestic violence, and that wife-beating and sexual abuse remain to be regarded as private problems which should not be discussed outside the home.

Worse, the group claimed, some women had grown to see wife beating or abuse as ordinary or normal.

Ace Saatchi and Saatchi prepared the multimedia advertisements for free, and will be sponsoring its dissemination.

Advertisements will show the hotline number of Gabriela (02-374-3451), which women can call for counseling or assistance.