My Voice, My Strength: A lady starting her hive journey

“If women will understand and exercise their power, they can remake the world.”

Top of the morning to you all, fellow Hivers!

I am a female native of the second-poorest province of the poorest region in the Philippines. I was born to dedicated public servant parents and am the youngest child of six. I was raised by a traditional family and spent most of my sheltered life in the city, where the regional government is headquartered.

My parents invested so much in my education because they believed that it was the only thing that could protect and liberate us and could not be taken away. I attended Catholic and Jesuit schools from elementary school until my postgraduate education.

I was married to a promising young man, but my life crumbled when a bullet from a drunk man took him away from our young family. I suddenly found myself a housewife who had to raise two kids alone.

Our regional government embodies a very patriarchal society where women are second-class citizens, no matter how empowered one can be.

You cannot imagine what single parenting means in a patriarchal society.

Despite the odds, I landed work in this male-dominated government to provide for my kids. In my 16 years working there, I saw how politics and culture shaped governance and how power, greed, and corruption caused injustice to low-income people. Hence, I am desperate to become an instrument in influencing and leading my fellow women in a participatory approach to effect change and drive development in our region. However, gender disparity is one issue at its highest in a patriarchal society.

Breaking the stereotype of women, I traveled to different countries. I later enrolled in an international graduate school for another master’s degree to legitimately crack the glass bubble in the higher echelons of our patriarchal society.

My frequent travels abroad and my admission to the international graduate school allowed me to meet some of the best people in my life, who restored my confidence and taught me to look at development problems and life in general from a better perspective.

With my education and exposure, I can apply my higher learnings to elevate the status of women who have limited access to essential community services, who are vulnerable to violence and trafficking, who lack livelihoods, and who are in dire need of various types of support. It is high time that women are heard, recognized, and included in the decision-making process.

Since the historical peace and development situation in our region placed women in the most disadvantaged and vulnerable position, I look ahead to a purposeful opportunity to advocate for their recognition and for including women in our area in nation-building. I am now setting up an organization for women of the underprivileged (or “disadvantaged”). I am taking the lead. I am one of them.

I am hopeful that women’s sphere of operation will go beyond the home and family, that we will be adequately represented to embody our rights and interests, and that we will be given a meaningful role in the implementation of different policies, more specifically involving alleviation, if not total eradication, of graft and corruption, resolution of conflicts, achievement of peace, acceleration of economic growth, and reduction of poverty, among others.

Fellow Hivers, I am every woman: a daughter, a sister, and a proud mother of two distinguished young adults. I am thankful for the life I had in the past. My most challenging times were why I kept going until they built me into the strong woman I am now.

I am willing to lead other women in actively participating in the development of our homeland. We are women who understand and will exercise our power to remake our province.