Women

On Thursday, entrepreneur, coffee and women’s rights advocate and STARweek contributor Chit Juan will address the 6th annual Women’s Empowerment Principles opening plenary at the United Nations headquarters in New York. The WEPs are a set of principles – treating all women and men fairly at work, promo-ting equality through community initiatives and advocacy, among others – offering guidance to business on how to empower women in the workplace, marketplace and community. On the same day, in Manila, there will be a women’s business summit that will focus on women mentoring women on entrepreneurship and business. The summit will feature as speakers and mentors successful women entrepreneurs, women in the corporate world, in academe and other industries.

With two women presidents and two women chief justices in our history, the Philippines is a leader in the world in terms of gender equality. The 2013 World Economic Forum “Global Gender Gap” report released last October ranked the Philippines fifth among 136 countries surveyed, the highest among Asia-Pacific countries. The report noted that “the Philippines is the only country in Asia and the Pacific that has fully closed the gender gap in both education and health.”

All that is something to crow about, and we celebrate the achievements of Filipinas in the national and international arenas of business, industry, the arts and others. And yet we have situations where women are still terribly disadvantaged.

Over the past week, I learned of a woman who gave birth to triplets at a government-run hospital. At just 26 years old, she is the mother of nine children, and with hardly any pre-natal – or post-natal – care, the births were premature and both the mother and the babies were in distress. In the same hospital, there was a baby that weighed 590 grams – a little over half a kilo; the baby did not survive. A few days after that, a baby weighing 680 grams also did not survive. As I write this there is a 705-gram baby clinging on for dear life.

All these babies were born prematurely, to young mothers who have other children to take care of, who did not have – because they could not afford – pre-natal care and proper nutrition, thus jeopardizing both mother and baby. These were unplanned pregnancies, and the women seemed to have all but resigned themselves to the fact that they would probably get pregnant again, and would probably have problem pregnancies again because they simply do not have the money for any kind of nutrition or care for themselves or their babies.

Unfortunately this is more common than it should be, and for a country that is a leader in gender equality this is a shocking, shameful situation. All these as the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012 is languishing in limbo because of a temporary – until forever – restraining order issued by the Supreme Court on its implementation. RA 10354 can give these women – and their children – a chance  at a healthy, dignified and productive life, and as we mark Women’s Day on March 8 let us go beyond rhetoric and truly give women – all women – the respect and empowerment they deserve.