- 3 weeks ago
- #thefutureisfemale
Forty years ago, the All Women’s Action Society (AWAM) was born out of a small but determined group of Malaysian women demanding justice and equality. And as AWAM marks its 40th anniversary, we ask: why does gender-based violence persist? And how can each of us be part of changing that story? On this episode of #TheFutureIsFemale Melisa Idris speaks with Betty Yeoh, trainer & counsellor for AWAM, and Jayamalar Samuel, Capacity Building Director at AWAM.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00hello and good evening i'm melissa idris welcome to the future is female this is the show where we
00:15find the extraordinary in every woman now 40 years ago the all women's action society better known
00:24as awam today was born out of a small but determined group of malaysian women demanding justice and
00:32equality now today public marks its a 40th anniversary this year but we want to ask on the show why does
00:41gender-based violence continues to persist and how can each of us be part of changing that story so
00:48joining me on the show today i'm delighted to introduce the good folks from public betty yo who
00:53is a long-time women's rights activist and one of awam's founding members she's currently a trainer
01:00facilitator on issues such as sexual harassment and survivor support I also have Jayamala Samuel who
01:06is the capacity building director at awam she's active in awam's training and gender-based violence
01:12outreach as well as public advocacy ladies welcome to the show it's so good of you to join me here
01:17lots to talk about and um it really is uh such a um an institution in a civil society landscape
01:26especially fighting for women's rights betty you're one of the founding members uh can we start at the
01:32very beginning how did awam begin and um what was it that the founders were trying to change in 1985 is
01:42that right yeah that's right so it's a long time ago thank you for inviting us uh belisa so uh as you
01:51mentioned in 1985 a long time ago that was a period of there's a lot of violence both physical verbal etc and
02:01uh we have new people returning we have uh students from overseas who have returned and that year 1985 also
02:11marks the end of the decade for decade of women it started in 19 1975 ends in 1985 and so all the combination
02:22of issues brought about a two-day workshop so this is the historical workshop that brought about all the
02:32different groups of people for this two-day workshop in March 1985 and it covered all the different
02:41forms of violence gender-based violence and after the workshop the people who came from various
02:47organizations felt that we need an organization that can make change so that was how a few of us
02:56because we all come from different organizations we came together and we started to form a society
03:03the all women's action society which everyone calls awam so you can see the word awam actually stands for
03:11all women's action movement which was what we wanted but of course the registrar said no no movement is too
03:19militant so it changed to you maintain as all women's action society but they kept our one for us so all
03:26this combination brought us but i actually like it better than public because there's the cloak the localized
03:34flavor of it right and it speaks to the fact that women are half of the society we are also part of it
03:39public so we must be recognized as such today our um 40 years old talk to me a little bit about
03:47the uh what the organization is today and maybe a little bit about your role in it okay the organization
03:54has really uh how to say it strived in the sense that um we still value the senior people who have
04:02shaped and built public and we and currently the office has a team of seven young people okay mostly
04:11young women you know who who came and joined public mainly in the last two years and they they have
04:18been they've been part of awam in work of uh training so we have young women uh working on training on
04:25issues on anti-sexual harassment with the corporate partners we also talk about issues on period poverty
04:32and we target the university we cater to the university students and college students and also
04:38schools where we are invited and we also have uh public pro also currently which started during in the
04:4690s on the services called talenita awam has been very actively providing services and we work very
04:54closely with the police with the ministry of women where we share our data on domestic violence on gender
05:01based violence and also we also provide a lot of advocacy work we are quite active in our social media
05:07okay can you tell me a little bit more about talenita the helpline service because it's one of the
05:12longest well if it i think it is the longest serving helpline services for um domestic violence gender-based
05:20violence tell me a little bit more about that yeah talenita is kind of uh can we also say the heart of
05:25our in the sense i think uh betty was one of the pioneers who initiated it also and i think it's in
05:31early 90s and it started with us taking on calls on issues on domestic violence and gender-based
05:38violence and we still continue to do that and we mainly have a talenita number and we reach out to
05:44nearly thousand plus women and men in uh in a in a year you know so this year we have really reached
05:52out to more than 600 people but and we do not say uh it is communicated to men oh sorry
05:58communicated to women it's for women and men and no matter what race uh and sometimes we do have
06:05clients calling us want to speak in mandarin or tamil we also coordinate that so that they can able to
06:12speak in the language that's comfortable with them and currently in uh we have uh intern counselors
06:19who are working with us uh and we have a talent room and also we have a legal people who are also
06:26working with us whereby they give legal advice why is it important that we have this service that we
06:32maintain this service that we that talenita continues on for another 40 years um betty can you tell me a
06:40little bit about what talenita represents to um survivors of domestic violence gender-based violence
06:50whether this intervention re well has helped change a life or save a life i think talenita by its name
06:59is tele which is telephone and nita for one nita so that's how it's combined talenita when we first
07:06started to support women who face all the different forms of gender-based violence very often women who
07:14speak out and all that could be seen like are you sure all this happens to you when in those days when
07:20you go to the police they will say you go back prepare something nice it'll be okay so all these things
07:27giving women no space for them to alert what they are going through and having a phone was very helpful
07:35because you could call in and express what it is that you need and that's why we train people to
07:42provide immediate support through the counseling and if they need legal information we have our legal
07:48pupils to also help and that's how that has also helped during the coveted time people cannot go out the
07:57phone is the only connection that gives them support so that is why talenita is a very important tool
08:04to support everybody not just women yeah but men and you also have children sometimes really you can
08:12have children who who not anyone below yeah yeah the older children may call up and say that they face
08:20this so once true talenita is established you can we are inviting them to come in in person so that we
08:28could share with them more and teach them tools to help themselves so that's a very important connecting
08:34to it's the first um it's almost the psychological yeah and the first kind of reaching out for support
08:42right the first touch so wonderful that you have this and such an important um service you provided
08:49public but public has also been behind many other milestones right and very proud to have been witness to
08:58to bear witness to some of the milestones betty tell me about the milestone well two milestones that i
09:05definitely remember because those were the exciting times uh for the domestic violence act of 1994
09:12before it was already passed but it didn't get implemented until 1996 so in order to facilitate
09:22the fast implementation we we as in the women's group actually ambushed the the minister during one of
09:33her function the minister of national unity then to request her to put pressure to say that please get this
09:41act implemented and prior to that it was passed at the very last minute before the parliament was
09:49over so those are very exciting times there's no internet to help you to go and spread your message
09:56it was postcards and actually going down to the parliament to hand postcards or whatever to talk to the
10:04mps so it's a very grounded activity i'm sure movement building at that time was a whole different
10:13it's a whole different ball game right you have to really put in the the the kind of work you have to
10:20go on the ground and and talk to people about your issue so that was on domestic violence act but that
10:27took 11 years in all 11 years nine years the campaign etc passed and two more years to wait for it to be
10:35implemented subsequently when that is done we work on the anti-sexual harassment so the draft the first
10:43draft is 2001 okay but it only got passed in 2022 so it was over 20 years wait i think if we are not so
10:56healthy and strong we might not have been able to see the light of the act but thank god we managed to
11:03get it through and by the time it came to uh 2018 that's changed movement in the government and they
11:12started to say let's revive this act and by 2022 it got passed and it was a real anti-climax because in the
11:20parliament the minister of women presented and they called for a vote and everyone who looks less than
11:30three minutes everything gone for a 22-year work less than three minutes passed and we in the women's movement
11:37started to call one and uh hey the act passed we were like was it that was it was wow I think if we
11:45were not watching on that morning we wouldn't even know that the act was passed what does that tell you
11:51um betty about the way change happens when you work at something you chip away at it for 20 years
11:59and it passes in three minutes what does that tell you about the nature of timing the nature of um
12:08shifting attitudes towards gender equality women's rights and the like i think it it one is you really
12:16need to withstand time be dedicated enough to continuously work on it both you create enough groundswell
12:26people already start to hear about it they know about it it's no longer a taboo word to talk about
12:32this so people are comfortable to do it and a lot of awareness even during the coveted time this law was
12:40passed just passed just after kobe even during the kobe time we organized advocacy session online with all
12:48the members of parliament so we had online the advocacy work with the members of parliament since
12:55we couldn't go there so this kind of commitment dedication and also going in for the long haul is a
13:02must if we are doing advocacy work sometimes i think um the battery is drained right there's there's
13:10you lose hope maybe after decades you think oh it's really we're really not going to see any movement
13:16but you know when change happens it happens all at once and you have to check did it really go through
13:22did it pass through um jaya talk to me a little bit because you have really um experience in the kind of
13:29frontline work of this from your observations you're monitoring your work what are you seeing now
13:34in terms of the current landscape of gender-based violence um has it have any patterns shifted are you
13:42seeing it evolve in your time as someone who's been working in women's rights okay um the issue of
13:51gender-based violence still remains in the sense we still have even when I started working on issues
13:57gender-based well in my early in my mid-20s you know in Penang I still saw the call on abuse
14:04domestic violent abuse and we still have it so the awareness building is a long journey but
14:10what is we see evolving is more of a younger people being exposed to gender-based violence being
14:16how to say also facing intimate partner violence and also we have cases of femicide whereby the
14:23the women mainly um not only go through a situation of gender-based violence but they also
14:29die out of it you know so in public we start slow monitoring that you know to see what is that's the
14:36pattern we see you know uh on issues on femicide and issues of intimate partner violence whereby
14:43sometimes they are in a relationship but it's not a legal relationship so there's also such violence
14:49happens between the partners and also online gender-based violence is also happening so because
14:55it's um it's slowly evolving and we are also catching up and monitoring and so what we do is we
15:02also work with other organizations our sister organizations okay to see how we could also address
15:08the issue of online gender-based violence and recently uh we also did a survey on anti-sexual harassment
15:16and in in in the in the universities and colleges just to understand whether it's happening you know
15:21so we are currently analyzing the data what when you look at data like that and the kind of trends
15:29that have what do you see um whenever you see maybe a spike so there was a lot of discussion about
15:35during lockdown that there were increases in gender in domestic violence gender-based violence
15:40because everyone was at home and you know tensions were high pressures were high uh and then also
15:46recently there was news that there's these random spikes increased number of cases of domestic violence
15:56how do you read those types of trends and patterns someone within public i think for us when we read this kind
16:04of trends and patterns we see few things one service is still important okay you know so we need to provide
16:11services especially to the communities who are very far to reach you know and and services are not only
16:19the one we provide in tali nita which is very important also providing shelters so although it started
16:24in the uh many years ago like in the 20 30 years ago but these services are very important needs and also
16:31institutionalizing the issues on violence against women and gender-based violence that means educating
16:36the younger generations from the very young age to respect both gender you know and also to the
16:44important how to identify if such a violent happens because violence sometimes is not physical it could be
16:50it starts with emotional violence we also see issues like sexual grooming but if we don't educate a child
16:57on understanding that this can happen to him or her because it happens to boys it also happens to girls
17:04so I think education is very important but it shouldn't be an ad hoc education that's where we go one
17:09off to the school or sometimes when there's a peak of an issue happening then we go and talk about it i think it
17:15should be institutionalized in schools starting from primary even in the kindergarten yeah you know so that like
17:22in the kindergarten maybe we can we can't talk issues about sexuality per se but we can talk
17:27about good touch and bad touch so age appropriate age appropriate age appropriate and involvement
17:33of young people is very important they shouldn't be the one at the receiving end of education but they are
17:38should also be involved so that they also help to shape because they know better what they go through
17:44yes you know so so the trend is mostly services and institutionalizing all this education and
17:51awareness and having it in multi-language because we are a multi-racial country so having it in
17:57multi-language is very involved very important and fourthly is I feel the involvement of faith-based
18:02organizations are also very important because a lot of us go to our mosques temple church and everything and
18:10some of and some most of our children are also involved in going for mengaji going for sunday
18:16school and things like that so I think involvement of faith-based organization in these issues of gender
18:22based violence and creating equality and respect for both men and women and also people of others
18:29how to say diverse diverse people even including disability it's very important betty do you have anything to
18:36add to that in terms of the fact that you know institutionalizing this is very important right
18:42it's wonderful that the public is being able to provide some of these services but we really should
18:47be thinking about how to institutionalize this to provide support i am also quite curious about
18:55some of the changes that have happened with gender-based violence it's spilling over into the online
19:01space and to real life it's moving to younger and younger people as I mentioned and whether that
19:06changes the type of response that's needed the type of support that's needed i think the for now it's
19:13quite well known that mental health is a big issue among all the generations and bringing in parents
19:21yes is very important because parents of the older generation have that set of thinking about male and female
19:28roles but parents of the new generation are more open they are like friends and we want to encourage
19:35preferred uh parents to be more friends to the young children because then it will allow them to
19:43have open communication it's when there is no communication between the child and the parents
19:49that they do not know where to go to and society society itself needs to be aware so that when you
19:57can't speak to your parents you're scared of your teachers there's someone out there that you can
20:02also reach out to that is why lines like telly nita the talian case and all plays a very important
20:09role because children know how to make calls they they make the right call and they will be connected to
20:15the right people so that is something that even society needs to know you know sexual harassment for a long time
20:22time you can't get any help but now either workplace or in general there is space for you to make reports
20:30there is space for you you know to claim your rights if you have been sexually harassed so it's a different
20:37change in society that provides more support to the people unfortunately is the people not looking
20:45out to go and find the different resources for themselves that's a really good point so if someone
20:52watching today says how can i in my individual capacity act in my everyday life um to change
21:02this situation changes the situation around sexual harassment around gender-based violence
21:09what can i do and also separately what can they do to support the public because you know this is a wonderful
21:16you're a wonderful organization doing important work and I think that it deserves support from us
21:22the public so both of you if i can ask what we can do in an individual capacity um to change society and
21:29also to help the organization i think one of the things we always tell people is to be an active bystander
21:36you know we are active if there's an accident we want to see what's the number and all that but
21:43when there is a gender-based violence we tend to tell people don't talk so much it's their business so
21:50be an active bystander see what you can do if you're able to do something do it of course be safe to
21:57yourself first if you cannot do on your own get someone to help you otherwise you delegate it to somebody to
22:05do it and in this way we are helping one another we are safeguarding one another and we are able to
22:12support one another so that's important whether it is for violence or for any growth in our community
22:20yeah yeah say something right speak up speak up okay for me is um if you want to be involved it's you
22:27can always volunteer there are various uh you can volunteer in public we do have volunteers and when
22:34you volunteer in public you also be part of the training so your capacity is built and when you
22:38meet with your friends in your network you can share the right information okay so that's possible
22:45in the sense and also uh how to say um be part of awam in the sense currently awam is 40th anniversary
22:52we are celebrating so this is a canvas of change uh we have drawn uh 25 uh portraits um you know by
23:00our malaysian hattis hakim abdullah so there are some paintings that we have that um we are selling
23:08to raise one because um you know sometimes people think when you work in an ngo or when you work in a
23:15how to say a civil based organization we work as volunteers
23:20but yes we do volunteer our service but we also get how to say we need funding of course especially
23:26funding to serve the community the community serves the women and men in need and to do a lot of
23:32programs uh for children and also to the college students so we need money you know and we need
23:40resources so that's why for this year awam as part of celebrating our 40th anniversary we came up with
23:46this portrait book and then also we have portrait 25 portraits and we will be exhibiting it from the 19th
23:53to 22nd 19 october to 22nd on 19 october to second november second november at umu yes yes well the
24:02portraits are beautiful yes yes and i wish you both all the best and all the fundraising that's necessary
24:11for this for the important work that you do thank you for coming on the show and telling us a little
24:16bit about um about the need for institutions like i appreciate your time thank you thank you that's all
24:23the time we have for you on this episode of of the future is female i'm melissa idris signing
24:29off for the evening thank you so much for watching and good night
Recommended
25:58
|
Up next
26:27
25:16
22:02
1:49
27:29
Be the first to comment