NYC Fil-Am Women Speak Out Against GMA's SONA

FiRE/GABRIELA USA stands together with the true PEOPLE'S SONA

Fifth Ave, NYC- In the hustle and bustle of NYC with tourists and businessmen hurrying through the streets, FiRE, a group of NYC Fil-Am women and other Fil-am organizations protested against GMA's State of the Nation Address (SONA) in front of the Philippine Consulate. GMA's speech held great promises of budget increases for education, agriculture, senior services, and other basic services-- however, the budget would come from the Value Added Tax (VAT) program, which taxes all basic commodities in the Philippines. But how could workers be able to pay the VAT when there hasn't been a wage increase in 10 years! Again, GMA strikes again with another year of lies and deception to try to appease the current economic crisis that compares to times of the Great Depression.

FiRE (Filipinas for Rights and Empowerment), a group of Fil-am women and daughters of migrant women, denounced GMA's lies and words of deception to the Filipino people. During her address, GMA hardly recognized the difficult labor and suffering of the true state of the nation that is abroad. From the teachers, to the nurses, and to the domestic workers that are exported and trafficked to the U.S. from the Philippines at 3,000 people per day with the majority being women, GMA did not take into account how these women's basic human rights are being oppressed. For examples, Hazel, who was raped by a US serviceman in Japan, who has not had justice served since the charges were dropped by Japanese government; or the Sentosa 27++ nurses who were illegally recruited and trafficked to the US by the Sentosa Recruitment Agency. Instead of making sure that these women workers rights are being upheld, instead GMA and her administration, admire deeply these migrant women for their huge remittance checks that they must send back to their families which keeps the economy afloat.

"GMA does not care for the women of the Philippines that have sacrificed their lives to go abroad abandoning their own children to take care of others'. She does not care for the women that have been raped, tortured, daring their lives to work abroad. She only cares for that big fat remittance check," exclaimed Jackie Mariano from FiRE. "As Filipinas in the U.S., we stand together with our sisters and brothers in the Philippines who joined the streets today in the annual SONA mobilization with 13,000 people strong. There is hope for the Philippines. We've ousted Marcos and Erap. We can do it again!"