Report ppp eng

“การสงเสริมบทบาทผูหญิงในฐานะผูสรางสันติภาพ" "Strengthening the Role of Women Peacemakers"

มูลนิธยิ ุติธรรมเพื่อสันติภาพ Justice for Peace Foundation สิงหาคม 2556 August 2013 1

Capacity Building for women in South Thailand

“Strengthening the Role of Women Peacemakers�

August 2013

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Acknowledgements The Project on “Capacity Building for women in South Thailand” was conducted

by Justice for Peace Foundation (JPF) and was supported by the Southern Border Provinces Administration (SBPAC).

The report on “Strengthening the Role of Women Peacemakers” was written by Shadia Marhaban. The report was reviewed and edited by Angkhana Neelapaijit chairperson of Justice for Peace Foundation.

The report was translated by Pipob Udomittipong.

Justice for Peace Foundation thanks to the Southern Border Provinces Administration (SBPAC) which made this project and the production of this report possible.

JPF also thanks to H.E. Mrs. Christine Schraner Burgener, Ambassador of Switzerland to the Kingdom of Thailand for providing the location of the report launching.

JPF thanks to the Patani women who so openly engaged this process, who gave their time, trust and gave the comprehensive information for this report.

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Abbreviations : Pattani

one of the southern border provinces of Thailand.

Patani

Thailand 3 southern border provinces – Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat provinces or called the people who live in Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat.

CEDAW The UN Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women UN SCR 1325 UN Security Council Resolution 1325 CSO NGO

Civil Society Organization Non- Government Organization

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Capacity Building for women in South Thailand Purpose of the Project : To provide capacity building for women and to facilitate training on conflict, transformation, negotiation and mediation skills for Muslim women in three provinces (Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat) Location of Event: CS Pattani Hotel and Imperial Narawatiwat, South Thailand Duration : April – August 2013 I.

GENERAL INFORMATION A. Background

II.

TRAINING A. Training Methodology B. Content C. Mediation and Negotiation skills D. Training Activities

III.

CONCLUSION

I.

GENERAL INFORMATION

A. Background In 2007 a new Constitution was adopted, incorporating many of the constitutional protections of gender equality and non-discrimination that the 1997 Constitution had previously enshrined, as well as introducing new provisions specifically directed at improving access to justice in general and for women.

Previous guarantees of equal rights for men and women, equality before the law and equal protection under the law, and a prohibition on discrimination on grounds of origin, race, language, sex, age, disability, physical or health condition, personal

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status, economic or social standing, religious belief, education or political views were included once more. 1 In Thailand’s Southern border provinces, violence which has escalated since 2004 has incessantly affected the livelihood of the local Muslim population. Women, in particular, have to suffer a great deal from the turbulence, injustice and various kinds of structural violence including violence against women /girls, drug abuse, income disparity, impoverishment, food security, etc. These problems prove challenging for women in their role of taking charge of their families and raising their children. It is particularly true for women who have lost their breadwinners and are now solely responsible for the household.

A number of women have had to change their roles from being wives or daughters to leaders and breadwinners of the families. They take efforts in studying various special laws applicable in the local area including Martial Law, Emergency Decree on Government Administration in States of Emergency B.E. 2548 (2005), or civil and criminal laws. Life is hard for them considering their existing low education and weak literacy in Thai language and having to take on the economic burden of the families as family leaders coupled with the lack of available means and resources to do so.

Many women have to bear the burden of taking care of their families after the loss of their husbands. Similarly, wives whose husbands have been injured or disabled now have to take care of the families. Though receiving support from the state, it is barely enough since they often have many children. With low education, the women find it almost impossible to earn enough to feed their families, particularly to support their children’s education.

Many of the women have been abandoned as their husbands, brothers or fathers are on the run. They stay under close watch of the officials and are subject to 1

Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand, B.E. 2550 (2007), Sections 5 & 30

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inquiries and other pressure to make them leak information concerning the location of their husbands, brothers or fathers. In some cases, they are taken to and held in custody at the military barrack being forced to disclose the location or information concerning other family members who are suspected by the officials. Many of the women have with them very young children, and when being held in the military barracks, they have to bring their children along. 2 Therefore, under conflict and violence both men and women have equal rights to participate in conflict resolution processes. As an essential component of a robust peace process, women must be included and the dimensions of gender recognized. For any process to be democratic and fair and thus capable of contributing to a sustainable peace -it must include and support both sexes alike.

Peace building and post-conflict reconstruction processes must include women’s voices in addressing the root causes of conflict and in transforming institutions, structures and relationships within a post-conflict society.

Training Methodology Many questions were asked during the training on the matter of methodology that was used. Many of the participants were not familiar with the method of education and experimental learning. The participatory learning method was explained with drawing, role-playing, and hands-on material. The training group is a first field of experimentation and observation (Paolo Freire, Augusto Boal).

Training builds on the experiences and questions put forward by the participants in order to extend their limits, and to develop new perspectives. It has strong skill orientation and therefore involves participants in active discussions.

According to JPF, a child as young as one year old has been detained along with his mother in a military camp in Pattani

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Another method used was the Public Narratives. Participants related their stories about the history of Patani and their struggle through conflict and social fragmentations. These perceptions of the history of their country and background provided the basis of the training. In this way, they were made to understand how to move forward as a society. Marshal Ganz, a Harvard Kennedy School Professor, introduced the idea of public narratives through three elements: •

A story of self : why we are called to what we have been called.

•

A story of us: what our constituency, community, and organization has been called to its shared purpose, goals and vision.

•

A story of now : the challenge the community now faces, the choices it must make and the hope to which it can aspire. 3

The training has been designed specifically for the targeted groups by breaking it into four components: A. Muslim Women and Conflict illustrates the basic concepts of conflict and those proposed for conflict resolutions, in this case focusing on the dignity approach.

B. Muslim Women and My Civil Rights explains the context of Thai civil rights that involves conflicts.

C. Muslim Women and Peace-Process Participation gives a brief overview of how to contribute in the peace process, such as participating in the peace talks through negotiations and mediations.

D. Muslim Women Urge Others explains how to make bigger changes by urging others to dialogue and to create coalitions as well as networks.

There is a much greater need for this kind of trainings in all of the three Southern Thailand's provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat, than in other provinces because of the on-going conflict there. The training medium we used was Bahasa 3

http://www.wholecommunities.org/pdf/Public%20Story%20Worksheet07Ganz.pdf

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Melayu while the Thai for reading materials. We found it was easier and more comfortable for them to express their views and relate their feelings to the narratives in their own language.

A. Training Activities Training started in April 3-5, 2013 at the C.S. Pattani Hotel. The second training was in Narathiwat and the last one in Pattani.

The number of participants joining the training was between 19-25 women.

The training sessions were facilitated by me as the main trainer and consultant, and

by Angkhana Neelapaijit - Chairperson of Justice for Peace Foundation, Bangkok, as supplementary trainer. Her role was intended primarily to improve the knowledge of participants on Thai constitution as well as relevant laws related to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UNSCR 1325 and especially to CEDAW. In addition it is equally important to prepare Muslim women from the three provinces to be aware of these issues and for them to be able to translate the national policy into action. At the same time the training also provided them with some practical examples of negotiation structures in order to allow them to understand that they can, not only be part of the structures, but also to have real effects on them.

Participants were also given the tools to learn how to map a dialogue or negotiation: - what is the entry point for women, what the priorities are and how women can make a difference in peace negotiations.

Sentiments of identity and ethnic divisions were expressed more strongly as the training proceeded and the participants became surer of their safety, the confidentiality of the sessions and the impartiality of the trainers. We realized that much similar trainings had been done numerous times in the past even jointly among both Buddhist and Muslim communities. During our earlier observation we felt there was an urgent need to discuss about the issue exclusively among the Malay Muslim themselves because, as we have mentioned above, we needed to use their 9

own language in order to come as close as possible to their narratives and to be able to listen more by using a mixture of Malay cultural norms and Islamic tenets as entry points to understand them, to know how they feel, what they want to achieve, what changes they want to see, what they want to share and most importantly how do they see themselves now. We conducted a lot of explorative discussions, dialogues and inner reflection exercises to allow them to reflect as is they were at home in their own community. Although it was a bit challenging in the beginning to break the ice as they were very careful even among themselves about their security.

Trust was a big issue with them the dynamics of which we could see in every discussion.

During the Public Narrative session, participants expressed much anger and disappointment. They said that there was a big misunderstanding among the Thais about the Muslims. The Thais stereotyped the Muslims as terrorists and backward.

This stereotyping, according to the participants, has created hatred and anger towards the Muslims among the majority of the Buddhist Thai citizenry.

We found in our observation that it was obvious that religions have become the main issue of hatred because of the growing division in the community and the lack of cross cultural exchanges and understanding from both sides of the dividing line.

A growing radicalization of the Islamic teaching among the Malays of the three provinces has become one of the factors that build the mindset and establish the knowledge about Islam that were once was moderate that allowed them to live in harmony and tolerance with their non-Muslim neighbors.

Many of them did not realize that gradual process of this radicalization due to lack of a deeper understanding of Islam themselves and the slim opportunity to learn except from the narrow milieu of their parent, local religious teachers (Toh Imam) and the Pondok (local Islamic religious schools). The women are also following a set of tradition that has been embodied in their community combined with what they learn during the conflict. The level of frustration and failure to trust 10

the government is high among the women especially in terms of understanding what the conflict is all about and how the problem can be solved.

Some of the women are relying on financial supports from Government Bodies or International Agencies to get more public support in their community as means to legitimize their leadership role.

Hereunder are some of their written statements; Only initials of their names are given in accordance their request.

Z- How can we trust the government if they themselves committed the crime and always get away with all the hostilities they have committed? That is why we refuse financial support or compensation from the government. The elite Muslim women activists used us to speak to foreign donors or Embassies to get funding, sadly when the funding is distributed we usually receive nothing except some information. The elite women activists usually are doing the same thing again and again without addressing the core problem, without giving us an opportunity to speak not only as victims but as actors of the conflict; we are desperately in need of a space to speak outside the “victim” box . The solution for Patani women is not only economic empowerment but really…a room to grow and speak as a Patani women with all our strengths and weaknesses.

A- Legitimacy is an issue in my community, how can we speak to them? They don’t care about the struggle, they only care about their own security. I was arrested many times and questioned by the Military, none of my neighbors tried to help, I walked with my mother to the Military station with both legs shaking and imagining what would happen to us? There is no solidarity at all from my neighbors when things like that happen to our family. I have learned since then that many of us want to see changes in Patani but while we fear for our lives, they fear for their bowl of rice and this situation is depressing for all of us….

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H- My husband was taken away from our house five years ago and until today I don’t know what has happened to him, his whereabout, whether he is still alive or already dead. An ironically the Thai military believe I know something about his whereabouts.

I am raising three children on my own, luckily I have a good job as a teacher.

B- The Thai government will never grant Patani any level of “autonomous status” like Aceh or Mindanao because they don’t want to listen and they feel that this country belongs to them only without respecting minority rights of us the Malay and our religion. We don’t want to hate the Buddhists because they are part of us, but we feel that the government policy is pushing us do that, giving us a choice that is not a choice.

N- We are worried about teenage pregnancies and drugs in our community; we know this is not only the problem for some particular family but for the society as a whole. How can we face the public..many of our Muslim women are pregnant out of wedlock and this bad influence has corrupted our tradition, cultural norms and our religious tenets.

C- I have never attended a training like this before; we are very free here in expressing our views and our demand for independence and dignity for our people. The Malay Muslims have suffered so much and the women carry most of the burdens. This training is great for us as a place where we can exchange our views and experiences, to understand and learn about our obstacles and limitations. I wish we can have more training like this in the villages in the future.

D- When the men talk to us about religion we don’t know how to counter; we just have to accept whatever they say based on what they have thought for us. We are desperately in need of women religious scholars, we need to sit with those who understand the true Islamic teachings who would discuss it openly with us. So far none of us has the quality and the leadership to do this.

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After this Public Narrative session, we broke into groups to talk about the problem in Thailand by drawing a tree to symbolize the Patani people: the leaves as their problems and the roots as their “root causes”. Participants realized that the exercise gave them the means to understand the problem in its entirety while before they had always looked at it only at the surface level. This activity also gave them the ability to map problems and the tools to analyze conflicts in their communities objectively. Many of the participants used the sentiment of independence to raise the issue of discrimination. They were also addressing the moral degradation in their society, such as the fact that many of the Patani Muslim teenagers are involved in drugs and at the high number of teen pregnancies.

During the discussion the

women were split in their views regarding the issue of teenage pregnancies and the drugs related problems. They debated if the teenage pregnancies and drugs related issues are relevant to the issue of the conflict or these two phenomena were simply some effects as results that emerged during the conflict. The majority of the women believe that identity and recognition issues that have never been identified, recognized and resolved are parts of the factors causing the conflict. The women also criticized the way the Malay Muslim families raising their teenage children without spending quality time with them, not even in discussions over dinner or trying to understand them. The hierarchical system in the Malay Muslim culture is obviously supporting the patriarchal system, the father as the head of the family symbolizes the family itself. Although the current situation pushes the women more and more into this role as head of the family, the society still can’t accept this reality. That’s why every NGO’s actions and programs in the three provinces are targeting victims: single women and orphans, and empowerment programs for single mothers and other such like charity based activities. This is not simply a preference of the NGO but has the obvious reason behind it: this is the only space considered “safe” for women there because of their image of being “feminine”, good mother, good wife and so on. So very little attention have been paid to the political activities at the grass root levels that would allow the women to gain legitimacy for their new social 13

leadership and decision making roles in the community. For all intends and purposes this lack of legacy as leaders of the family also becomes problematic for these women; although they are the ones who support the family financially, many of them, to get away from this situation of non-respectability of their social status, and not to be seen as struggling single mothers and incapable of taking care of themselves and their children, the women would send off their children, especially boys, to the pondoks to study religion. Most parents think that religious teaching is sufficient for the boys when they grow up and were expected to behave properly and be able to live a normal life like any other people, despite their difficult background.

Most participants talked about “Merdeka” (independence) as the only way for the Malay Muslims in three provinces to protect and preserve their identity. But when I asked them how they were going to achieve this ideal in the face of such immense difficulties, none of them could offer any idea.

Another story related by a participant told a curious side of the multidimensional problems facing them. Some who received funding or compensation from the government were considered “weak” and not fully committed in the struggle for the Malay rights. There is an ambiguity in their understanding of their ideal for independence; on one sie it is translated as cannot have any other way than making the Thai Government their enemy, on the other as citizens of the Thai Nation they accept freely any assistance or compensation offered by the Government, which is given with the intention to win their heart and mind and to weaken their struggle.

Negotiation and Mediation Techniques Negotiation and mediation techniques are included in the training, using exercises and discussions. Participants showed a great deal of interest although they lacked the skill to really grasp the techniques. Trainers use role-plays, in depth discussions, exercises and visual aids. These exercises are important for them as peace builders, in order to become familiar with the international law and women's rights movements across the globe.

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The women felt that they were left stranded without knowing what is going on in the new Malaysian Government mediated negotiations between the BRN and the Thai Government. It is interesting to see that the women did not feel that this limitation that is imposed on them is actually the norm of the society they live in.

Although the majority of the participants expressed their disappointment to their own male dominated leadership bodies for the lack of real information about the current negotiations, a few others believed it was better for them to be ignorant of the development because their duties were just to keep the family safe..

Conclusion The bottom-line problem for development in Patani is that whatever assistance coming from the Thai Government is seen only as a temporary solution by the Patani Muslim community. On the other side of the coin, the reluctant to speak the truth about the conflict by the Thai government is becoming also a serious problem because and this leads to the feeling in the Muslim community that because of their religious differences the government is looking at them as enemies of the State and this has caused the whole Thai Buddhist society not to listen and understand about their grievances.

When peace is initiated, either by individuals or organizations, the Government would see it as an attempt to weaken national unity, instead of an opportunity to open up discussions on the possibility of reaching a comprehensive dialogue across the communities.

With regards to the civil society, there has been almost no attempt to institutionalize popular participation from below. There is no coalition-building effort to strengthen the struggle for common interest and no reformist leader has appeared to build an alternative to the corrupt leadership in order to establish accountability and the good political dynamics of their struggle. This is because activism in the three provinces focuses primarily on strengthening local or 15

individual positions and interests. There are also very few efforts made to enhance the position of women. We haven’t seen much emphasis on aspects of human rights and good governance monitoring. Women at the government level can champion gender equality issues within the governmental structures, but at the same time they can also hamper progress and empowerment of women. If they are weak financially, technically or politically, they can’t be effective partners. If they are led poorly or have priorities widely divergent from women organizations, they can become part of the problem and not the solution 4. Therefore, establishing and building coordination between the women CSO and government structure is important not only for performing good work but also for creating synergy on the issues and building trust.

Despite the massive injection of funds for gender training programs in Patani, there is very little progress in increasing women’s awareness of their rights. This negative situation is due to several reasons. Firstly, the gender training and/or campaigns usually have targeted only women and have failed to involve men, who should join in order to become educated about women’s rights. Secondly, the NGOs have concentrated on assisting rural women through livelihood projects as an immediate solution to improve their dire financial situations, thereby neglecting political or human rights aspects. Most local NGOs are unable to negotiate the substance of their trainings with international donors who seem to be only interested in seeing that their money is spent correctly according to procedures. As a result, the real local potential for building a strong and pro-democracy civil society has been neglected.

Despite the challenges in education the Malay women has created exclusiveness that prevents them from growing individually as well as communally.

There is no strong coordination between the leadership and the grassroots. Women’s aspirations are considered only from the economic point of view excluding totally the political aspects especially in decision-making process. This reality creates a

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What women say; Participation and UNSCR 1325 (A case study assessment) Sanam Anderlini (2010)

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situation where the women think of themselves as victims who need assistance and become very dependent on handouts.

Another crucial problem is there are almost no attempts to connect these women of the rural areas with those who are active at the national level. Whenever there is a meeting, conference, seminar or workshop being organized in Bangkok the same women would always be sent to attend as representatives. This situation has resulted in the failure to increase the capacity and empowerment among the women who are members or linked to the movement. They feel that they are being excluded in civil society funding process except the one from the government or University, with the consequence that at the end of the day they are left to feel as “begging” from the government. The heavy focus on financial compensation hampers investment in sustainable livelihood projects or educational expenditures. Because many recipients have low formal education and economic capacity, they are incapable of managing the sudden “windfall” of financial resources coming from the compensation programs and thus the real problems remain unaddressed. A broad variety of the challenges makes it clear that temporary economic facilitations cannot be assumed to be limited to be mere technical or financial matters, but has to include a political education in order that the women understand well their rights and thus be able to play a role in that domain. Although it is true that women in conflict situations need economic means to improve their position in society as well as support to improve their mental and intellectual self-reliance but all of these would be meaningless without strengthening their political participation. In addition to the economic and political deprivation, the women have also suffered from traumatic experiences.

While it is certainly not easy to overcome all the problems related above, the training sessions have shown that there are ways to overcome them gradually, by the following process:

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1. Develop a series of training sessions aimed at establishing dialogues and understanding across the different groups, be they based on racial, ethnic, religious, geographical or other differences. The UNSCR 1325, Negotiation and Mediation Skill Training Procedure should be used to attract and unify interests of the invited participants of different backgrounds to attend. Billing future training sessions as dialogue promotion may inhibit certain groups who may have decided against it a priori. At the end of a training session, participants should feel that they have gained new and valuable skills, while unconsciously they are also building understanding to overcome their differences.

2. Malay Muslim women should be given more exposures to other conflict situations in the world, by holding training sessions away from their own situations, which must be overwhelming and seemingly hopeless for them.

Comparing their problems with other would make them understand that theirs are not unique and intractable. Lessons learned seminars, especially in relation with women experiences in conflict situations should be organized such as the cases Aceh and Mindanao in the Philippines. Acehnese and Moro women activists have and are still attending such training in various areas in the world away from their own countries to give them wider perspectives and broader views on their own problems. Indeed, there are currently visits organized for some BRN officials to visit Aceh on such lessons learned tours, but not a single woman has been included.

3. A “school” of politics for Muslim women in the three provinces -- which would be an empowerment. Such a school must concentrate on training on democracy, political party formation, voters’ education, women rights, advocacy activities and related political knowledge. The word “school” should not be interpreted as a permanent educational establishment with 18

buildings and teachers, but merely a regular organized training session lasting 3 days to a week for 20 to 25 participants at a time.

4. Peace negotiations should be inclusive and mediators and the government should ensure broad participation of women from different sectors, including female representatives from rebel groups, the government and civil society.

Women’s organisations, as well as special gender advisors, should be consulted throughout the negotiation process. In addition, governments and the international support structures for the peace process should provide safety and protection for women who are taking part in negotiations.

5. Mediators and government should provide mechanisms for outreach, consultation and inclusion of women’s voices into their standard operating procedures. There should be a gender audit and an evaluation of mediators and relevant government departments of their compliance with the standard set out by UNSCR (United Nation Security Council Resolution) 1325. Finally, women’s credibility should not be limited to gender issues, but also to those intended

to

strengthen

their

participation

in

the

areas

of

DDR

(Decommission, Demobilization and Reintegration), security, post-conflict and political transition by providing them with relevant capacity building and skills training.

These supplementary efforts in political education, training and organization building are also aimed to help shape the democratization process in Yala, Narathiwat and Pattani to enable the people in general and women in particular to do more explorative efforts towards solving the conflict.

Women should play

important roles in conflict mediation, and after the conflict they need to be active in the process of healing the pain due to victimization during the conflict and to be able to have their voice and aspirations accommodated through political decisions. More

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efforts should be made to strengthen women participation in the public space and political decision-making, based on women’s aspirations from below.

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