Jakarta, August 5, 2005 – A program was launched today to empower marginalized women to defend their legal rights and reduce violence and discrimination against women. The initiative, called the “Women’s Legal Empowerment Pilot”, will work with the police and courts to help them better serve the specific needs of women. The pilot is part of the World Bank’s Justice for the Poor Program and will cover five sub-districts (kecamatans) across three provinces: West and Central Java, and West Nusa Tenggara. The pilot will be implemented by the highly successful PEKKA (Women Headed Household Empowerment Program) initiative which supports groups of women at the village level with capacity building and microfinance activities. PEKKA has provided social and economic empowerment to over 6000 women in nearly 200 villages across 8 provinces. A specific program to improve access to justice for women is necessary, as women’s rights are often ignored at the local level. "Our experience shows that women's legal rights are frequently exploited. There is a real need to change village women's expectations of their rights and provide avenues for them to enforce these rights", explained Nani Zulminarni, PEKKA’s National Coordinator. A regular “Multi-Stakeholder Forum” will be convened under the pilot. Representatives from the police, prosecutors, courts, and other justice sector stakeholders will be encouraged to work together to improve community legal education on women’s rights issues and monitor reported cases. A network of trained paralegals in the villages will be established to facilitate community legal education as well as provide a first port of call for women seeking legal assistance. The pilot will not only strive to improve women’s legal awareness and support them to enforce their rights, but will also work together with the Women’s Desks (RPK) in police stations to increase women’s access to justice. RPK are the designated gateway for women to file legal complaints with the police. “Although over 200 RPKs have been established across the country, they do not always provide optimum service for women victims of violence. The pilot will assist the RPK to increase their responsiveness and gender-sensitivity and to build women’s trust in the RPK’s services,” explained Dewi Novirianti from the World Bank’s Justice for the Poor program. According a report released by the National Commission on Women’s Rights (Komnas Perempuan) on 8 March 2005, the number of cases of violence against women has doubled in the past year. “Most cases are domestic violence,” said Kamala Chandrakirana, Chairperson of Komnas Perempuan. The Ministry of Women’s Empowerment estimates that 20% of Indonesian migrant workers are victims of human trafficking and the majority of these are women. However, current documentation of domestic violence, trafficking and other cases vastly under represents the scale of the problems. The pilot will document and use violation of women’s rights cases to advocate for legal reform at the national and sub-national level.
The Women’s Legal Empowerment pilot is collaboration between PEKKA and the World Bank’s Justice for the Poor program with funding from a UK Department for International Development trust fund. Justice sector reform is a key priority in the World Bank’s Indonesia Country Assistance Strategy for 2004-2007. The Justice for the Poor initiative aims to enhance community legal awareness, strengthen village institutions and provide communities with links to external legal assistance and facilitation and to support the outreach capacity of local Civil Society Organizations. The program aims to help communities resolve problems themselves before they reach the courts. But where access to the legal system is required, it seeks to equip poor communities to defend their interests successfully. *** |
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