[asia-apec 1546] 1st Fil-Can National Forum a success!

[BAYAN]

>From the Philippine Women Centre of B.C. 
pwc at attcanada.ca; <http://www.pwc.bc.tripod.com/>www.pwc.bc.tripod.com


UNITY FORGED AT HISTORIC FILIPINO-CANADIAN NATIONAL FORUM

The city of Winnipeg, Manitoba buzzed with the presence of over 100
Filipinos gathered for the first-ever Filipino-Canadian National
Consultative Forum: "Unity in our history, struggle, and resistance towards
the genuine freedom of all Filipinos!"  From August 25 to 27, 2000 for three
days they engaged in intense discussion, debate, and deliberation to reach a
historic point of unity in the making of this young community in Canada.

Hosted by KAMPI (Movement of Filipino Workers in Manitoba), the national
forum drew 120 participants from all over the major cities of Canada -
Winnipeg, Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, and Ottawa.  The forum was filled
with the stories, experiences, and spirit of resistance from Filipino
migrant workers, women, and youth bringing together all sectors of the
Filipino community on a national level.

They came together and forged unity in their history and understanding of
their migration to Canada, on the current struggles their community faces,
and finally on their resistance against their marginalization in Canadian
society and as overseas Filipinos.  Their unity marks a milestone in the
history of Filipinos in Canada.

Through their collective unity, the stories they shared helped to fill the
blank pages of Filipino-Canadian history and helped to paint an
understanding of their current struggles as a young migrant and immigrant
community.


Timely juncture for national gathering

The forum came at a timely juncture in the history of the Filipino community
in Canada as little has been documented about their history of migration and
their current situation.

Everyday, Filipinos are entering Canada.  With this influx, they are one of
the fastest growing immigrant communities.  Numbering over 300,000 in 1996,
the Filipino community is ever increasing.  As a direct result of the active
export of Filipinos working and living in 186 countries escaping the
grinding poverty of the Philippines, the number of Filipinos in Canada are
growing.  With this dynamic growth in their community, the national
gathering provided an opportunity to seize this opportunity to unite in a
comprehensive understanding of the roots of their migration, in their
current situation, and in their commitment to struggle.

The national forum aimed at uniting progressive Filipinos also came at a
timely juncture because of the current crisis in the Philippines.  Escaping
the Philippines because of grinding poverty, intensifying militarization,
grave displacement, heightened attacks on workers, and a dwindling basic
livelihood, around 3,000 Filipinos leave their country everyday in search
for survival abroad.

This intensifying political and economic crisis in the Philippines was one
of the major focuses of the forum.  A main topic on the table were the
follies and foibles of the growingly fascist U.S.-Estrada regime and the
intensifying human rights attacks against the people.  Intensifying
militarization throughout the Philippines has caused massive displacement
spawning hundreds of thousands of internal refugees forced from their land
at the barrel of a gun and at the harsh hands of multinational corporations.

Estrada's war mongering against the Muslim people of Mindanao as they
struggle for independence has only exposed his anti-people intentions just
like his signing of the Visiting Forces Agreement signed by Estrada which
has turned the country over to the occupation of American military bases.
His iron-fisted rule has only brought terror and massive displacement on the
lives of the people.

This cruel treatment and displacement also spills out internationally.
There are currently 8 million Filipinos displaced from their homeland eeking
out a living as migrant workers in 186 countries.   The participants
understood that their presence in Canada is a direct result of this crisis.


Unity in our history, struggle, and resistance

Opening night

The forum kicked off with an exciting opening that featured cultural
presentations and a variety of speakers.  KAMPI welcomed all the
participants and international guest speakers with warm militant greetings.
Providing the context and history to the gathering was Cecilia Diocson, the
Global Council Representative for Canada for Migrante-International.  She
spoke about the decades of organizing within the Filipino-Canadian community
laid down building to the historic gathering.  Finally, the participants
received greetings from a host of supporters such as a message from the
Honorable Becky Barrett, Manitoba's Labour Minister, and the Honourable Pat
Martin, the NDP critic for Immigration for the Parliament.  With this, the
forum was under way as the participants geared up for the next two days.

Discussion and debate

To open and set context to the gathering of overseas Filipinos, a keynote
address was offered by Fidel Agacoili, the Chairperson for the Committee on
Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law for the National Democratic
Front of the Philippines.  He offered a framework for the participants'
understanding of their prescence and problems in Canada by bringing to the
forum an international perspective on the present crisis and human rights
situation in the Philippines.  With his presentation, he tied the massive
out-migration of Filipinos abroad to the chronic crisis of the semi-colonial
and semi-feudal society of the Philippines that offers its people little
opportunity to survive.  Coupled with the current fascist U.S.-Estrada
regime, he outlined how systemically and brutally the people's human rights
are being attacked.  Fidel ended his presentation with a discussion on the
prospects for resolving this crisis and bringing an end to the people's
desperation with the NDFP's program for a just and lasting peace.  The
keynote set a strong and comprehensive tone for the rest of the forum.

With this important framework, the forum took to bringing out the stories
and struggles of migrant Filipinos.

The first panel speaker, Joy de Guzman, vice-chairperson of
Migrante-International deepened Fidel's opening discussion with a closer
look at the modern-day diaspora of the Filipino people.  She offered the
forum lessons on organizing among migrant Filipinos by sharing
Migrante-International's organizing work as an alliance of progressive
overseas Filipino organizations.

With this update from this Philippines, the forum focused on the history,
struggle, and resistance of Filipino-Canadians.  As the Canadian
representative to the Global Council of Migrante-International, Cecilia
Diocson, explained Filipinos' history of migration to Canada and examined
the root causes of this migration.  From this history, she shared the
current struggles and challenges 40 years of forced migration to Canada has
brought their community.  She outlined the extreme underdevelopment and
inequality of their community.  She spoke about the Canadian government's
current Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) that brings in Filipino women to
work and live as temporary workers to cook, clean, and care for the middle-
and upper-class Canadian families.  Cecilia pointed to this government
program as a primary structural tool that segregates the Filipino community
as a highly-ghettoized pool of cheap labour.  She also brought out the
stories of young Filipino-Canadians facing racism and an almost complete
loss of their roots and heritage pushing them to question their identity and
role in their community.  With this, she emphasized the history of
resistance to this marginalization of the Filipino community and shared with
fellow overseas Filipinos in Canada the upcoming challenges and
opportunities ahead.

The last panel speaker was Ninotchka Rosca, international spokesperson for
the Purple Rose Campaign, a campaign to end the sex trafficking of Filipino
women and children.  Ninotchka brought out the need to look critically at
the reality that among all the Filipinos that are forced to live and work
abroad, the majority are women.  She spoke about the total commodification
of Filipino women in the international sex trafficking industry.  Her
accounts of the gross exploitation, abuse, and oppression of trafficked
Filipino women throughout the world showed the extent of this problem.  She
also made sure to point to imperialist globalization and all its instruments
(IMF, WB, WTO-GATT, etc.) as the culprits of the intensification of the
trafficking of Filipino women as prostitutes, mail-order brides, and
entertainers in all corners of the globe.  Ninotchka also extended with a
challenge for Filipinos in Canada to participate in the movement to end the
trafficking of Filipino women.

Grounded in the understanding and analysis presented by the keynote and
panel speakers, the participants took to their workshops which focused on
the themes: labour and migration, immigration, systemic racism, human
rights, trafficking of Filipino women, and Filipino-Canadian youth and their
issues. In the workshops, the participants were able to share their
experiences and come to a deeper understanding of these issues.  Based on
this greater awareness of their situation as Filipinos in Canada, a good
part of the workshop focused on coming up with recommendations and actions
for change in their community and what change they could bring about for the
Philippines towards equality for all Filipinos.


Stories and struggles

The national forum gave the community the freedom to finally share their
history, stories, and struggles as migrants and immigrants displaced from
their homeland and exploited as a cheap labour in Canada.

Local and national media coverage broadcasted these stories and the success
of the forum to the public, bringing into the consciousness of Canadians the
resistance of the Filipino people.  A consciousness previously clouded by
stereotypes and a lack of genuine understanding of Filipinos in Canada.

Since the 1960's Filipinos have been migrating to Canada as teachers,
nurses, doctors, architects, accountants and other professionals.  Today,
this migration has only grown as the Philippines plunges deeper into poverty
and Canada calls for cheap and docile labour become louder.  More than ever
before, we are seeing hundreds and thousands of desperate Filipinos
migrating to Canada with the counterfeit dreams of escaping exploitation
only to be used as cheap labour - forcibly de-skilled, underdeveloped, and
degraded.

This reality came out strongly with the sharings from Filipino women brought
into Canada as cheap and highly-skilled nannies through the Canadian
government's Live-in Caregiver Policy.  Melca Salvador, Acier Gomez,
Parallag, Leticia Cables - all Filipino women, all domestic workers, all
targets of unjust deportation by Canada immigration, and for
Filipino-Canadians all stand as symbols of the cruelty of forced migration
and the disposability of Filipinos in Canada.  These were just some of the
examples of the stories the community shared about their lives in Canada.


Towards the genuine freedom of all Filipinos!

The final day was dedicated to forging the unity they had built over the
last two days with hammering out of their forum declaration and the
recommendations and actions they agreed upon.

Stemming from the understanding built over the entire forum, the
participants committed themselves to carry out educating, organizing, and
mobilizing work on a local and national level.  The forum took a clear
position to scrap the racist and anti-woman LCP.  The participants also
agreed to a resolution to hold a national Filipino-Canadian youth forum to
be held in Toronto in June 2001.  There was also support for the October
2001 North American Filipino women and women of Filipino ancestry
Consultative Forum in Seattle, Washington.  There were also strong actions
resolved by the forum to support and involve Filipino-Canadians in achieving
genuine change, development, and peace in the Philippines for the just and
lasting peace of all Filipinos.

In the end, the forum has made a lasting mark and milestone in the
development of the Filipino community in Canada.  With this gathering and
grounding in their understanding of their history, Filipinos in Canada have
entered a new stage in their resistance and struggle.  As captured in their
final declaration: "Declaring our unity in our understanding of our history
of migration to Canada, We reaffirm our commitment to raise to a higher
level our collective struggle towards our genuine peace, development and
freedom.  The victory of our people's struggle will be a significant step to
ending the oppression of people the world over."

















_______________________________________
Celebrating a Decade of Struggle
Philippine Women Centre of B.C.
ph/fax: (604) 215-1103
Check us out at: <http://www.pwc.bc.tripod.com/>www.pwc.bc.tripod.com


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