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A Library for Kampung Tering

Murni Bte Liga of Kampung Tering, an idyllic village in the outskirts of Kuala Pilah, has a burning desire. She is passionate about improving access to quality education for her community. She has often raised her concerns about quality education for Orang Asli children in meetings with authorities or civil society organizations. One of the issues that she finds problematic is the high attrition among Orang Asli children at primary and secondary school levels. In order to address the issue at her village, she decided to set up a functioning library which could be used by the children. Women from the village organizing the reading material for the library She noted the interest of mothers' in the village who want their children to improve their English language skills. She expressed her interest in running workshops on a monthly basis for her community. The workshops would focus on improving the language skills of the children who participate.  Essay writing activities ...
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Learning to Mentor

Background I had a wonderful opportunity to attend a useful workshop organized by the Malaysian Institute of Management (MIM) in collaboration with Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS). The workshop was entitled 'Women Mentoring Development Programme' was attended by over 40 women from various fields: civil society, small and medium level entrepreneurs, training and education.  The training was conducted in English by two master trainers who have had experience in mentoring women entrepreneurs. They presented a comprehensive workshop structure which included personal mastery, skills mastery and process mastery. We started with discovering our basic personality attributes to understand our prominent characteristics. We were introduced to a local developed personality assessment tool the LEONARD Personality Inventory. It was quite interesting to discover one's strength and shortcomings based on the analysis.  I am going to highlight some of the elements of the worksh...
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Indigenous Women's Leadership in Malaysia

Temuan community from 3 villages (Kg. Tekir, Kg. Tering and Gebok) Land is integral to the identity of the Orang Asli community in Peninsular Malaysia. The increase in land grabs at the expense of the Orang Asli rights has culminated in the community resisting through court cases, blockades and demonstrations. This video clearly describes the predicament of Orang Asli and land ownership as elaborated by Tijah Yak Chopil of Jaringan Kampung Orang Asli Semenanjung Malaysia (JKOASM).  Empower's experience of conducting leadership programs for Orang Asli women has been very insightful. The initial engagement started in 2013, when a fledgling focus group discussion was conduct among 10 women leaders from Negeri Sembilan, Selangor, Pahang, Perak and Johor. To date, Empower has managed to train 50 women with leadership potential from various villages in Peninsular Malaysia.  Land Mapping Workshop in partnership with JOAS in June 2016 Thus far the modul...
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Lydia of Kampung Gebok She is a young mother of three children who attended Empower's Orang Asli women's leadership training in 2013. It was her first experience attending a training made up of entirely women from various other villages in Peninsular Malaysia. She belongs to the Temuan tribe and daughter of a village head.  Though, her father has passed on, his daughter has begun to take on a major role in decision-making at the community level. When she is not busy with attending to the needs of her community, Lydia harvests fruits from her lush orchard which is blessed with 'petai' trees over 100 years old.  Encroachment - Mining  Lydia's village came under serious danger due to the interests of a mining company which started operating in the periphery of their village. What was clear, the corporation wanted parts of the village which was covered with dense forest and orchards of the community. The community  depended on the resources...
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Kami Wanita Orang Asli, Dengar Suara Kami!

I have been part of a long term capacity building project to develop women leaders among the Orang Asli community (Indigenous People) organized by Empower (Persatuan Kesedaran Komuniti Selangor). The communities we have been working with come specifically from Peninsular Malaysia. At the beginning we started out with a basic focus group discussion in 2014 with 13 women, to find out what the burning issues were. Tijah Yok Chopil  This brings me to an amazing activist who has really challenged the stereotype of Orang Asli women, Tijah Yok Chopil . She commands great respect for her ceaseless work challenging land grabbing of customary lands and confronting the state for human rights violations. Her journey has been long and of late, she shares of having lost long time comrades to the struggle. Tijah was instrumental in bringing together this group of women who became our initial trainees under this program. It was a purely capacity building workshop to increase women's lea...
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Giant Slayers - Asian Agri vs. Serikat Buruh Sejahtera Indonesia 1992

PT Andalas IntiAgro Lestari I surveyed this plantation yesterday which is located in Aek Kuo, Labuhanbatu Utara. It is part of the plantations under Asian Agri (Oil Palm Producer) in North Sumatra. There about 400 workers employed in this plantation, non-management staff. There are various tasks done by workers, harvesting, spraying, fertilizing and general work. Women work as daily wage workers or as 'buruh harian lepas' as they are known here. They earn IDR 61,000 per day ( RM19.29) working from 6.30 am to 1.30 pm. They carry out a range of tasks - spraying (semprot), segregation fertilizer (menguntil), weeding, census taking, maintenance and fertilizing (memupuk).  Women's participation Women are recruited by the management of the plantation but not as permanent workers with benefits. These women's husbands work on the plantation and are permanent workers or 'SKU'. The work tasked to women is part of the plantation's production. Some ...
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Networking with Women Community Organizers and Activists

Rare finds It is quite rare to find women activists working on women workers' issues in the oil palm plantations of Indonesia. They are generally part of the administration but very few are involved in organizing workers. Generally, NGOs organizing labour are very focused on broad issues like wages, land grabbing and unfair treatment by capitalists and agribusinesses. The focus on women is minimal as a target group for organizing and considered for supplementary activities to support the men who are being organized.  They may have be aware of gender inequality but this does not extend to efforts to implement gender mainstreaming in the programmes and campaigns. There is still an obvious gap and women are not benefiting from programmes. A higher level of commitment and focus is required to ensure women benefit from labour organizing. Solidarity As a feminist researcher working on social justice issues affecting women in the oil palm industry, I want to establ...
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