Villar bats for more women in government

Women occupy only 2,684 out of the total 17,460 elected positions in the country – Equivalent to 15 percent – from President to councilors.

With this, former Speaker Manny Villar batted for the inclusion of more women in elective government positions to give them a bigger role in nation-building.

"There definitely must be women in government particularly in elective positions," he said as he expressed confidence that Filipinos will elect more "competent and promising" women candidates seeking elective posts in the coming May elections.

The People Power Coalition senatorial candidate cited his partymates, and fellow Senate bets, economist Solita Monsod and former BIR Commissioner Liwayway Vinzons-Chato as among the "women of substance" who are running in the elections.

"Filipino women have shown that they can be equal partners in moving the nation forward and they can play an even bigger role if we elect more of them to represent us," said Villar. He also paid tribute to the efforts of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the country’s second female chief executive to appoint more and more women to various government posts.

"Now with the celebration of women’s month we must give recognition to our women leaders and hope that there will be more of them in government," he said.

Under Villar’s term as Speaker he affected the passage of several pro-women House bills. These include an anti-trafficking measure that imposes harsher penalties for traffickers of Filipino women while setting up at the local level a monitoring system to prevent white slavery.

Bills to give added privileges and benefits to pregnant Filipino women have also been passed by the lower chamber under Villar’s leadership.