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Malayan Plaza, Ortigas, Pasig
17 August 2009
by
LEILA M. DE LIMA
Chairperson
WELCOME SPEECH
Good morning to all of you.
First of all, let me thank the men and women of the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHRP), who have worked on this ASEAN NHRI Forum Protocol Against the Trafficking of Women and Children, and who have helped organize this national workshop. Let me in particular thank Atty. Liezl Parajas, the OIC of the Commission’s Women’s Human Rights Center (WHRC) and the focal person for this project.
The CHRP is the lead institution with respect to this initiative, a joint undertaking also involving the National Human Rights Institutions (NHRI's) of Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. This is a first for the members of the CHRP, and a first for any NHRI in the world. I am very proud of the work that you have done thus far, and I eagerly await the outcome of this workshop as well as future developments regarding this significant protocol.
Let me also thank Ambassador Alistair MacDonald and the Delegation of the European Commission in the Philippines. In January of this year, in an address before the Philippine Business for Social Progress organization, Ambassador MacDonald spoke on the issue of poverty. He said, and I quote:
“Never before in the history of this planet, has poverty alleviation and sustainable development been a more important issue. Here in the Philippines, with 90 million citizens and perhaps 9 million of these working overseas, and in a context of global recession, the problems which we face are clear … It is a global problem, a global challenge, and the success of our efforts in addressing this challenge will be critical for the future of your children and mine.”
Indeed, it is poverty which helps drive the trafficking of women and children in this region and beyond. It is poverty which makes women and children more vulnerable to the predations of those who would subject them to abuse and worse. It is poverty and the accompanying lack of livelihoods, dilution of protection and loss of hope, which help fuel this despicable trade in human beings. As we seek to protect and promote the human rights of those trafficked, we must remain mindful of the poverty which is at the root of this issue, and the need to underpin the economic rights of persons before they are trafficked.
The Ambassador spoke of poverty as a global problem and a global challenge in his address. The same can be said of the problem of trafficking. From recruitment to receipt, transportation and transfer, this issue affects countries from Bangladesh to Pakistan, Thailand to Japan, Eastern Europe to the former Soviet Union, and the Philippines, and more. This global problem demands a global response, and this Protocol Against the Trafficking of Women and Children is one component of that.
We thank the Ambassador and the European Commission for their support. Thank you for making much of this work possible. Thank you for helping us to make the protection of human rights more real for the people in this region.
Finally, let me thank the participants at today's national workshop. The future success of this initiative and this Protocol will depend largely on individuals such as you, people who are willing to commit their time and their energy, their experience and expertise, in order to craft the details of this project, in order to operationalize it and make it actually work. The role you play in all this cannot be overestimated. The Commission appreciates your willingness to contribute to this common endeavor.
Over the next two days, we will be looking at the experiences of government agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGO's) with respect to dealing with the issue of trafficking. We will observe what is being done today to prevent predation on women and children. We will scrutinize how the government and civil society attempt to dismantle the operations of those who employ deception and fraud, intimidation and isolation, physical force and debt bondage, in order to exploit women and children. And we will learn how the plight of victims of trafficking is alleviated, how their psychological trauma is treated, and how they are eventually brought back home.
Best practices will be highlighted. Where there has been success, we will seek to replicate this on a wider scale. Where initiatives and operations have not worked as planned, we will seek to learn from these disappointments so that they can be avoided, and any negative effects can be mitigated.
We seek to do all this through the prism of the legal mandates and powers of the National Human Rights Institutions in the region. NHRI's play a unique role and serve a special purpose, neither government nor civil society, but a possible bridge between the two, and acting in a manner which is independent, impartial and neutral.
Individual NHRI's possess certain mandates. That of the Philippines is found in the 1987 Constitution. We possess powers but at the same time, we suffer from some very real limitations. And as this Protocol is crafted, it is important that we remain mindful both of the potential of NHRI's for action, given their specific mandates, as well as the legal and other restrictions which affect the ability of NHRI's to act.
In the end, what we are seeking is a wider collaboration and level of coordination among the several NHRI's, governments and NGO's, in the region, and beyond.
We are therefore pleased to report a positive development in this regard, arising from the Commission's recent participation in the 14 th Annual Meeting of the Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions. As a side event to this meeting, the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines and the Jordanian National Centre for Human Rights, entered into a Memorandum of Agreement.
In this agreement, both NHRI's agreed, among other things, to conduct mutual projects aimed at enhancing respect for human rights in both countries, to extend services and work for the protection of the rights of migrant workers, to exchange ideas on a continuous basis, as well as exchange experts, and to designate certain officials within each NHRI tasked to lead the implementation of the Agreement.
This collaboration is especially timely and important in light of the current situation for migrant workers in the Middle East, and specifically Philippine migrant workers in Jordan. Just before we left Jordan last week, Commissioner Cardona and I had an occasion to meet and talk to more than a hundred workers, domestic helpers (all women, some of whom are minors), the so called runaways, seeking refuge in the labor office of the Philippine embassy in that country. They are mostly victims of illegal recruitment, now awaiting to be repatriated back to the Philippines. Many of them were subjected to difficult conditions, such as non-payment or underpayment of their wages, and physical or sexual abuse. To add insult to injury, some of them were also having to fend off counter-charges from their employers. And these problems are not limited only to one country. In a sense, this situation is representative of the other countries and other areas, where human trafficking continues to be a problem.
Trafficking involves global flows, with individuals and organizations scattered all around the world, facilitating the exploitation of women and children, making possible their transfer from their homes to foreign shores, away from familiar faces and familiar institutions, away from the protection of their governments and their families.
The vested interests in this trade of humans are many. Persons are profiting, and seek to increase their profits. Individuals and organizations are benefiting from the labor of the exploited. They will fight tooth and nail to prevent any change in the status quo. That is why we must build effective alliances, which cross borders and jurisdictions, which integrate disparate domestic laws and legal systems, and which can act in a rapid, systematic and standardized manner to reports of trafficking and instances of abuse, from country to country. Domestically and institutionally, let us build on the opportunities opened up to us by the recent passing of the Magna Carta of Women.
We recognize that when the rights of one woman in one country are protected, we are strengthening the protection of all women in our several countries. When we protect the rights of a foreign child, found in our own, we protect all our children here at home as well.
Again, I thank all of you for being here today, to participate in what I believe is a most worthy endeavor. May the future find the slavery-like practice of human trafficking banished to the dustbin of history, only read about in textbooks and not in our newspapers. With your support and with the support of institutions from around the region, and around the world, I am certain that we can make this happen.
Thank you very much. Maraming salamat po sa inyong lahat.