Jenita Eko

Local Researcher for Lake Sebu

Jenita Eko (Local Researcher for Lake Sebu), a full-blooded T’boli, is the founder and president of Lake Sebu Indigenous Women Weavers Association, Inc. (2001-2021) and of Tnalak Tau Sebu (Federation of T’boli Handicraft Makers, 2017-2020). Its core value is the protection of the Communal Intellectual Property of Tboli Tribe over Tnalak Handicraft designs through Geographical Indication (GI) Mark. As lead convenor, she is responsible for networking and GI Mark training which is conducted by the World Intellectual Property Office of Spain and Intellectual Property Office in the Philippines. 

Jenita holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from the Mindanao State University (MSU) College of Law Extension, General Santos City and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from MSU General Santos City. She served as school administrator of the first ever private kindergarten in Region XII which teaches indigenous people’s education. In 2012, she founded the LASIWWAI Learning Institute Inc. an educational institution offering free kindergarten program where culturally sensitive and appropriate education is firmly upheld. She sat in the Board of Trustee of the Mindanao Lumad Women Council and the Women Playwrights International (Philippines). Because indigenous women are denied the opportunity to speak out and decide for themselves, she developed a love of writing scripts for community theater – addressing the complex issue of marriage in the T’boli tradition and raising awareness of practices and norms which promote local culture and become source of T’boli pride as well as those that hamper development.

Jenita was awarded the Gawad Lingkod Katutubo in 2019 by Pamulaan (through Benjamin D. Abadiano) in 2019.