BANGSAMORO...

women are not excluded and their voices are heard.

They organized community conversations and workshops on gender rights awareness and other unattended issues confronting the women's sector.

“With the support from TAF, the main objective is to support the BWC communication plan that contains women’s rights, their political aspirations and participation, how BARMM operates and how they can support peace and development programs. They can also use this in their advocacy at the grassroots level,” Mariam Ali, MOSEP executive director, said.

Rahima Silongan, BWC executive assistant, said included in the commission’s programs are community gender awareness, giving Bangsamoro women a platform where they can express their views and take on issues that will, in the end, affect them.

“Letting them know their roles … is empowering them and giving them roles to play in achieving genuine peace and development in their communities,” she said.

Hadja Samaona Una of BWC-Lanao del Sur, said this program “gives awareness to our people in the grassroots level especially the former wives and family of former combatants and its communities.”

“This is inclusive, we let peoples organizations participate, the disabled sectors, and many more. It is the mandate of the Bangsamoro women to mainstream this sector, the former combatants and their families are included here, including the Bangsamoro Women Auxiliary Brigade (BWAB).

Silongan said “basically we are empowering them to participate actively in crafting policies, giving them workshops as to their roles, their issues and how they want to address these in the legislative processes.”

“We believe in the power of women, they have major roles to play, they not just mothers taking care of their babies but they are major players in policy making and legislation and BWC knows it fully well,” she added.