In this venture of taking stock of

a discursive past, it is vital to include

a perspective that considers gender.

This gender perspective attempts

to answer, among many queries:

Does massive human rights violations and

direct violence have a gender dimension?

Where were the women and the men and

what have been their experiences?

When reconstructing narratives,

whose voices do experts

and authorities include?

In designing transitional justice measures,

with whom do policy-makers usually

provide redress?

If women and men experienced

human rights violations differently,

are translators and storytellers at risk of

constructing a divided memoriolization?

TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE IS A VARIETY OF

PROCESSES AND STRATEGIES WHEREIN

A SOCIETY COMES TO TERMS WITH PAST

CRIMINAL MASS ATROCITIES,

USUALLY COMMITTED DURING PERIODS OF

ARMED CONFLICT OR OF AUTHORITARIAN REGIME.

During Martial Law, rape,

abduction and sexual slavery,

enforced disappearance

and sexual abuse, forced marriage

to perpetrators, and abandonment

were said to have been committed

against numerous women. One of

the narratives shared during the

TJRC Listening Process was that

of the 1974 Malisbong Massacre,

where girls and women

were allegedly brought into

navy boats, raped while in captivity,

and their bodies thrown overboard

after they had been killed.

In another TJRC Listening Process,

participants in Sibugay alleged that

women were taken from their families

and held in navy boats docked

in the ports of Labangan and Ipil,

and supposedly suffered from

sexual slavery. According to the TJRC,

a formal investigation of these

various forms of sexual and

gender-based violence (SGBV)

committed during this period

"is warranted to ensure accountability

for past abuse and to prevent

the recurrence of such violations

in the future."

THE TJRC UNRAVELED PATTERNS OF HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS AGAINST WOMEN

BEFORE MARTIAL LAW IN SEVERAL COMMUNITIES IN LANAO DEL NORTE AND

LANAO DEL SUR — RAPE, MUTILATION, AND KILLING PERPETRATED BY STATE AGENTS.

In the Philippines, the Transitional

Justice and Reconciliation

Commission (TJRC) was borne out

of the peace agreement between

the Philippine Government and

the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)

to specifically study historical injustices,

legitimate grievances, human rights

violations, and marginalization

through land dispossession of

the Bangsamoro people. Integral to

the TRJRC's work was the application of

the gender perspective in its

Listening Processes, Study Groups,

Assessment Research,

and Key Informant Interviews.

In its Final Report,

the TJRC highlighted gender in each

of the core issues of

the Bangsamoro region.