Magkaisa Centre Annual BBQ
August 14th, 12:00 NN
Earl Bales Park (South of Sheppard)
Please see map for directions.
It’s a potluck, so bring some food!

Toronto, ON – July 20, 2010 – Armed with the spirit of cultural resistance, more than170 Filipino-Canadian youth, women and workers filled the Arbor Room on the night of July 16 for “Roots, Rhymes and Resistance,” an annual cultural event hosted by the Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – Ontario (UKPC/FCYA-ON). With this year’s theme, “Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step Out, Stand Out!” the youth took centre stage to reaffirm their active role in shaping the Filipino-Canadian community’s future in Canada.

Showcasing multimedia presentations, song, theatre and dance from individual artists and collectives, these twenty performances depicted and celebrated the history  and the resiliency of a community that strives for their just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada. Filipino-Canadians continue to face worsening conditions as they currently make up the 4th largest visible minority group in Canada. “It is the younger generation that inherits the marginalization of our community – we see this as our youth are pushed out of high schools, remain under/unemployed and experience poverty and racism,” says Alleben Purugganan, a member of UKPC/FCYA-ON and the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario. For her, RRR is about the youth seizing the opportunity to change this path.  “We’ve never really had a moment,” she states, “as we’ve always followed a conservative tradition that either denies our reality or merely accepts the stereotypes imposed on our community. We are tired of this and we are creating a new culture that will make us youth count.”

One of the highlights of the night was a song entitled, “Inay,” performed by Vince Ledesma and Liphayette Hilado, the youngest members of UKPC/FCYA-ON. Their song of a child yearning for a mom who left home to work abroad was performed simultaneously with photos of their loved ones being projected in the background. As well, Veronica Abrenica shared her newly-produced short film “Anak.” Using a monologue first performed at last December’s RRR, the film exposed conditions of family separation, non-accreditation of professionals and economic marginalization. The night also featured the skill and talent of nine young and emerging emcees through a collective rap song on what it means for them to step out and stand out. Qara Clemente, Angela Abrenica and Walter Sanchez performed the song “All on You,” their remake of B.o.B’s “Nothin’ on You,” a fun and upbeat narration of the transnational lives of Filipino women around the world. UKPC/FCYA-ON also had the honour of having D.R.E.A.M. Dance Cru in this year’s line-up, as they rocked the second half of the night with an adrenaline-pumped performance.

“I had the great pleasure of sharing the stage with very talented performers, as well as truly genuine and focused individuals,” says Marcus Lomboy, on his experience in performing in RRR. “Those rare kind of people are hard to find, and I’m glad I was able to meet them,” he adds. Kitt Azores, a UKPC/FCYA-ON member, echoes Lomboy’s comments in saying that “It is having to share moments with people that are concerned with the establishment of a real and distinct Filipino-Canadian identity through collective struggle that distinguishes RRR from other cultural events.”

RRR may have provided a space for learning and growth for its participants. But more importantly, it was a chance for Filipino-Canadian youth to realize their collective potential to be at the forefront of social change. “We resist against the legacy of colonization and imperialism that continues to determine our lives,” states Azores, “For me, to step up and stand out means being able to conquer the challenges we face everyday.” The organization’s years of community work have revealed that Filipino-Canadian youth face systemic racism, marginalization and social exclusion. “To resist is to struggle and overcome these barriers,” he adds, “and ultimately, for our community to lead fulfilled lives.”

The night ended with the performers, organizers and volunteers all on stage singing the lines, “Ngayon, never give up the fight!” with their fists raised as they performed a song entitled “Step Up, Stand Out!” getting the audience all on their feet. “Filipino Canadian youth all over Canada are building a movement,” Purgannan describes, “And RRR is a testament to that!” Just this May, youth from UKPC/FCYA-British Columbia also hosted a successful RRR for Asian Heritage Month. Meanwhile, Kabataang Montreal, the organization’s chapter in Quebec, is getting ready to have theirs on August 6.

Upon reigniting the community’s legacy of resistance through RRR, all participants were left with more than souvenirs and are filled with a feeling of genuine militancy. “This is only the beginning,” declares Aila Comilang, one of the emcees and member of UKPC/FCYA-ON. Steeped in an awareness of their own history and current situation, Filipino-Canadian youth are more than ready to take their community’s future into their own hands.  RRR was a celebration of the continuous growth of a dynamic youth movement, and is a testament of what is to come for the Filipino-Canadian community’s history in Canada.

For more photos, check our Flickr page.

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For more information:

Contact Alleben Purugganan

(416) 519-2553

ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org

www.magkaisacentre.org

The Nanny Business follows Edelyn Pineda who waits to be picked up at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport on a freezing cold night in February. The 27 year old, university educated mother of 3 has spent a grueling three days getting from Hong Kong to Toronto. In her hand she holds a contract to work as a live in caregiver, her work permit and visa. She only has 10 dollars left in her pocket, all that’s left after borrowing money from a loan shark in the Philippines to pay for her flight and thousands of dollars to a Canadian recruitment agency.

She waits for 3 hours in the cold, but no one comes to pick her up. Instead of a good job in a family home awaiting her, she ends up in a crowded apartment of other Filipino newcomers. Edelyn’s story is one of the central stories in “The Nanny Business”. Almost 5000 Filipino women arrive in Canada each year with dreams of changing their lives through a federal program with the lure of a fast-track to Canadian residency. Instead, many find themselves in a nightmare – cheated by recruiters, and misused by bad employers, trapped in a government program that promised so much but ended up facilitating abuse.

In The Nanny Business we follow some very brave nannies who go public. With the help of crusading journalists, human rights lawyers and other parents, they are already forcing change. This is their story.

The Congress of Progressive Filipino Canadians (CPFC) marches with the working class and racialized communities in Canada with courage and militancy as imperialist nations and the world elite meet in Ontario for the recently concluded G8/G20 summits this past weekend. In recognizing the summit as a desperate move by imperialism to cover up the crisis of an economic and political system that is inherently violent and anti-people, CPFC calls on the working class in Canada and around the world to seize this opportunity to advance an international anti-imperialist movement that puts the liberation of the working class, women and racialized peoples at the forefront of the struggle.

Grassroots organizations and activists around Canada have organized teach-ins and mobilizations along the streets of Huntsville and Toronto this past week to express not only our discontent, but also our commitment to collectively educate ourselves and deepen our analysis on neoliberal globalization’s intensifying attacks to our communities. Progressive Filipino Canadians identify that the policies that will be and have been resulting from summits, such as the G8/G20, further marginalize an already exploited and underrepresented transnational Filipino community in Canada. It is crucial for us then, whose lives are most affected by this imperialist project, to know the true history and purpose of the G8/G20.

During the course of events this weekend, the media has focused on the “uncontrollable” violence and the “misuse of the freedom of expression” by the protestors, to whom Prime Minister Stephen Harper has referred to as “thugs.” To render activists and organizers as people who want to cause nothing but mere trouble is to forget the legacy of resistance that we inherit as a people whose land has been ravaged and whose communities have been exploited by centuries of colonialism and imperialism.

We must not forget the intent behind the creation of the G6 in 1975 – it was to consolidate the power of the top 6 nations of the world to establish neoliberal ideology as a framework for economic policy-making, and to quell the growing anti-imperialist movement in the Global South and within the imperialist nations themselves. Canada joined in 1976 to secure its role in neoliberal economy, followed by Russia in 1997, thus forming the top 8. Along the same lines, the G20 was formed in 2008 to establish a partnership between the existing imperialist powers and their allies from the Global South. G20 summits include the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, imperialism’s institutional tools for assaulting the lives of the poor and working-class around the world. G8/G20 share the same core goal – to coordinate mechanisms for the consolidation of the imperialist agenda globally.

We must not forget that throughout history, it is the very implementation of this neoliberal agenda both in the advanced capitalist countries and in the Global South that has furthered the colonial legacy that continues to keep our community in the margins. We must not forget that, as part of a transnational community who serves as globalization’s pool of skilled, yet cheap labour, our constant movement and marginalization are direct products of these political projects.

Earlier this week, Harper delivered a statement regarding the upcoming summits, emphasizing the role of Canada in leading the world to economic recovery through the deliverance of an aggressive free trade agenda. However, because we do not forget our history, and we do not turn away from the worsening conditions that the working-class and the racialized communities face in Canada, we know that this economic recovery is not for us.

As capitalism has entered another phase of crisis, our lives as people in the margins have become even more difficult as we continue to suffer from massive lay-offs and from the effects of the flexibilization of labour. And how has Canada responded to this? Rather than protecting the structures that attempt to meet the basic human rights of Canadians, they have made significant cutbacks from social services and have further privatized our education and healthcare systems.

In this crisis, it is racialized and working-class women who are hit the most. We see this as more and more Filipino women toil under Canada’s Live-in Caregiver Program, work as migrant workers under the Temporary Foreign Workers Program or are relegated to precarious service sector jobs and sex work. De-skilling and underdevelopment have marked the path of the Filipino Canadian community towards further economic marginalization and social exclusion.

Now we ask, is this the type of recovery that we will allow the heads of the top 20 nations and international financial institutions to pursue?

We already know what the world after the G8/G20 summits will look like. We saw it from the violence in the streets of Toronto this weekend, as heavily armed police hurt and arrest protesters. We felt it just less than a year ago, when our friends and family were laid-off from their jobs. And we still see it on those who are tired from working 16-hour shifts, or those who were pushed out of high schools. Some of us have felt it, when environmental degradation and extreme poverty have pushed us out of our countries to migrate. With the Canadian economy depending on the success of the establishment of the global imperialist order, we will, once again, be witness and subjected to the aggressive implementation of: underdevelopment, resource extraction and the facilitation of labour migration from the Philippines and the rest of the world.

We, as Filipino Canadians, denied of a just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada, are living testaments of the attacks of imperialism against working-class and racialized peoples. However, we have shown commendable strength and solidarity this weekend as we have taken our resistance to the streets for the world to witness our dissent against the G8/G20 summits. But we cannot stop here. We do not just oppose the G8/G20 summits, we oppose what it represents and the violence it perpetuates on our communities.

Hence we, members of the newly-formed Congress of Progressive Filipino Canadians, reiterate our call to heighten our resistance and intensify the educating, mobilizing and organizing efforts of our community. We continue to advance our work in building the community and making genuine solidarity with other communities in North America and movements in the South.

Progressive Filipinos, who have marched the streets in Ontario this weekend, and those in Quebec and British Columbia who have supported in solidarity, challenge community organizers, and the rest who have expressed resistance this weekend to strengthen our organizing efforts. We call on all working-class and racialized communities to strengthen our resolve to expose and oppose the imperialist agenda and work towards building a genuine solidarity.

As we strive for fulfilled lives and a better world, we will continue to march the streets for liberation, and advance the struggles of the oppressed, marginalized and working-class peoples around the world.

The people united, will never be defeated!
Expose and oppose the neoliberal project!
Down with imperialism!
Long live international solidarity!

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Organizations under the CPFC:
National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC)
SIKLAB-Canada (Filipino Canadian worker’s organization)
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – National
Sinag Bayan Arts Collective – National
Philippines-Canada Task Force on Human Rights (PCTFHR)

For more information:
Contact Joy C. Sioson
www.magkaisacentre.org
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org
416-519-2553

Toronto ON –

With just 15 days away, Filipino Canadian youth are tuning their guitars, pushing pens, polishing their dance moves, and raising their fists high as excitement builds for an upcoming cultural event called “Roots, Rhymes and Resistance (RRR): Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step up, Stand Out!” on July 16, 2010 at the Arbor Room at the University of Toronto. Originally featured in Vancouver, RRR will take centre stage for the second time in Toronto to showcase the culture of resistance rooted within every Filipino youth residing in Canada.

“RRR is one way to express our people’s long tradition of resiliency and our desire to collectively define our own community’s future here in Canada,” states Mervyn Mabini, one of the event’s organizers. Hosted by the Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – Ontario (UKPC/FCYA – ON), this event aims to be the space for Filipinos to hear, take part, and put forward the stories of our struggle through the form of music, spoken word, dance, live art, theatre, and multimedia performances. “After the success of the first RRR, we felt the eagerness of more Filipino Canadian youth to be involved in activities like these. It just proves that more youth is taking up the call advance the struggles of Filipinos as a transnational community living in Canada.”

Similar to the RRR held in December 2009, this year’s aims to raise funds in order to support and strengthen the community-based program that UKPC/FCYA has been enthusiastically engaged in for more than 15 years: to make Filipinos count in Canada’s future. As a growing youth organization, every cent that will be collected on this event will be used to sustain the material and financial expenses to build a strong and united Filipino Canadian community that reflects the vision of a just and free society. RRR is an event by the youth, for the youth. “This cultural event is going to be the our opportunity to raise awareness of the genuine settlement and integration that every Filipino Canadian demands and deserves.” Mabini adds.

In this night of cultural resistance, event goers are expected to witness the defiance of the young people on the issue of our community’s intensifying social exclusion and marginalization. With the support of the workers and women in the community through SIKLAB (a workers’ organization) and the Philippine Women Centre, the stage is now set for the youth as they affirm that their voices are now in tune to make the community hear that this is the time. July the 16th is the moment Filipino Canadians step up and stand out!

National Roots, Rhymes and Resistance
“Panahon Natin, Our Moment: Step Up, Stand Out!”
Friday, July 16 2010, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Doors open at 6:00 PM, show starts at 7:00 PM
Arbor Room, 7 Hart House Circle
at the University of Toronto
$10 Cover

For tickets and information:
Contact Alleben Purugganan or Aila Comilang
416-519-2335
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org
www.magkaisacentre.org

Toronto, ON – June 16, 2010 – Once again, Filipino youth, women and workers across Canada are seizing the moment in a resounding call to make Filipino youth count in Canada’s future. The culture of resistance takes centre stage as dynamic Filipino youth spill their talents on a national level at “Roots, Rhymes and Resistance: Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step Up, Stand Out!”

The show will be held at the Arbor Room at the University of Toronto’s Hart House on Friday, July 16, 2010 from 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM. Building off the momentum of Toronto’s first RRR held last December, event goers will be able to see a stronger and more vibrant range of performers from Sinag Bayan Ontario and more. Be prepared to unravel your creative minds as Filipino youth step up to the challenge of redefining Filipino culture through music, theatre, spoken word, dance and multimedia.

Throughout history, youth have always been at the forefront of stimulating change within their communities. In recognizing the inherent dynamism of Filipino youth, UKPC/FCYA-ON are committed to harnessing the potential of all Filipino youth across Canada through different artistic and cultural forms.

“We don’t come into this country as blank slates,” says Aila Comilang, a UKPC member. “We have our own histories, our own dreams and our own ideas of what it means to be Filipino-Canadian.” Since its first show in Vancouver over 13 years ago, Roots, Rhymes and Resistance has created a living history of resistance that inspired scores of Filipino youth to exercise their vision of an empowered community. 13 years later, that vision now reverberates on a national level as “Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step Up, Stand Out!” is simultaneously celebrated in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto.

Slated to be more lively and inspiring than the last, “Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step Up, Stand Out!” the night’s performances are sure to wow audiences by stirring them into action. Steeped in the culture of resistance, Filipino youth are asserting their rightful place towards attaining the community’s just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada. “Roots, Rhymes and Resistance: Panahon Natin, Our Moment! Step Up, Stand Out!” will be another monumental event that firmly reflects our community’s legacy of resistance.

“National Roots, Rhymes and Resistance
Panahon Natin, Our Moment: Step Up, Stand Out!”
Friday, July 16 2010, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Doors open at 6:00 PM, show starts at 7:00 PM
Arbor Room, 7 Hart House Circle
Tickets $10.00
U of T Downtown Campus
$10 Cover

For tickets and information, contact:
Kim Abis
(416) 519-2553
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org
www.magkaisacentre.org

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Community members, artists and gallery onlookers will recall the power and the impact contained within the pieces “Cargo,” “Singkil” and “Giant Maleta.” Produced under the theme of “End the Exploitation, March for Liberation,” these pieces were crafted by the hands of the Sinag Bayan Ontario arts collective, and embodied by the lives of the transnational Filipino women striving for better lives in their new home. “As young Filipino artists and community organizers, we see art as an opportunity to convey our community’s culture of resistance to our audiences,” says Alleben Purugganan, Philippine Women Centre of Ontario and Sinag Bayan Ontario member. “Cargo,” “Singkil” and “Giant Maleta” will not only show stories of struggle, but will also highlight the community’s resistance.

Sponsored by the Laidlaw Foundation, the New Shape exhibit “gathers pieces by artists who tangibly work towards creating the communities they believe in.” In a similar fashion, Maleta provides the artistic vision and practice for an empowered Filipino-Canadian community. As Mark Serrano, UKPC/FCYA-ON member says, “By bringing out important issues through art, we are encouraging all Canadians to unpack their Maletas and to look at how migration shapes us as a people.” Currently, Maleta finds a new home in the New Shape exhibit, albeit for a temporary period of time. Maleta’s transitory appearance, much like the Filipino transnational experience, is a sign of what is to come. Come October, the Maleta Project will continue into a new home, in celebration of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario’s 10th year anniversary. Similarly, Filipino-Canadians continue to struggle for their just and genuine settlement and integration by taking root in Canada as their new home. In celebration of PWC-ON’s 10th year anniversary, the Maleta Project’s grand exhibit will be held in a new location.

New Shape Exhibition
Gallery 1313
1313A Queen Street West
June 9th – 20th
Launch on June 14, 5 – 7PM

For more information, contact:
Kim Abis
(416) 519-2553
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org
www.magkaisacentre.org
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The two and a half day conference was organized by the various progressive Filipino Canadian organizations of the Kapit Bisig Centre in Montreal, Magkaisa Centre in Toronto, and Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver as an educational event to deepen understanding of the history and current situation of Filipino Canadians; to understand the nature of the Canadian state and society and their role in helping shape the Filipino Canadian community’s reality; and to develop action plans for just and genuine settlement and integration in order to achieve full participation and entitlement. The conference was also a continuation of a pioneering project launched three years ago: Filipino Community and Beyond: Towards Full Participation in a Multicultural Society.

As host organization, Kapit Bisig Centre of Montreal opened the conference on the evening of April 30th with reception and arts exhibit and closed the evening with three short films that were produced, directed and performed by Filipino Canadian youth and their organizations in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. All three films expressed the youth’s vibrancy and continued inspiration to educate, organize and mobilize the Filipino Canadian community in the midst of various challenges such as family separation, racism, poverty, deskilling and violence.

On the following day, the conference held panel discussions, fielded questions and shared experiences to deepen understanding of genuine settlement and integration for Filipinos who seek Canada as their final destination in their journey of migration. The morning session shared a brief history of Canada as a “white settler colonial state” whose current political economy continues to be guided by the dynamics of its capital accumulation within the larger context of a neo-liberal global economic system amidst a growing crisis in natural and human environments. It showed a timeline of the organizing work of progressive Filipinos in Canada and their organizations – from their inception and subsequent growth – within the framework of the history of Filipino migration after Canada removed the discriminatory racial provision from its immigration program in 1962. It acknowledged the importance of the three community centres in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal in bringing forward the struggle of Filipino Canadians to settle and integrate in order to achieve full participation and entitlement in Canadian society.

Today, Filipinos have become Canada’s third largest source of immigrants. At the same time, they are also part of that huge transnational Filipino community that seeks permanent home and settlement in their receiving countries even as they continue to maintain certain attachment to the Philippines.

Subsequent panels presented on the Canadian political structure – from federal to provincial and municipal – and how this political structure develops laws and policies such as multiculturalism and immigration that help shape our reality in Canada. Another panel presented a brief about social services in Canada, the challenge of accessing these services and how these are used as “social stabilizers” to maintain the existing political economy and social system under neo-liberal capitalism.

The panel in the afternoon gave an in-depth presentation on “Filipino transnationals” who have grown to around 10% of the Philippine working population. Many of these transnationals are in continuous “circular migration” from one country to another and seek permanent residences outside the Philippines. It looked at migration as life-altering and a journey that may have been “propelled by the need to earn money but the hope is to find life’s completion somewhere in that journey; a home, a community, a society that will value one’s work, a nation where one can make a difference and history,” not necessarily in the country of origin. Thus, the struggle for genuine settlement and integration becomes a primary call for these Filipino transnationals who may go back to the Philippines but for a brief visit or sentimental journey. The panel then tackled the challenge of community organizing based on participatory learning through the process of action, reflection and analysis of action and then, back to action for community and social transformation.

Subsequent panels looked into the issue of doing alliances and united front work with individuals and groups both inside and outside the Filipino community. They shared how the three community centres in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto developed and built linkages over the years that sustained and supported their various efforts at political education and mobilization. The last panel presented on arts and culture as tools for community organizing and mobilization. It emphasized that new art and cultural forms would have to be developed with their content reflecting current reality and challenges facing the community for them to be effective and have lasting impact.

The day’s conference was capped by an enjoyable solidarity evening where participants from various cities, including those from the United States, contributed their talents and skills through different cultural presentations. It was also graced by groups and individuals from other communities who contributed music and spoken words as strong gestures of support for and solidarity with the conference.

On the last day, the conference held an assessment and sharing session. Those who spoke praised the weekend event and accepted the challenge to create and nurture a new path of genuine settlement and integration – a path that would lead to full participation and entitlement in a multi-ethnic and multicultural society within a world that is facing the crisis of neo-liberal globalization and the crisis of environmental degradation and climate change. They decided to bring to their particular territories and organizations the conference declaration with its action plans for deepening and implementation.

The conference announced the formation of the Congress of Progressive Filipino Canadians (CPFC) as the national centre of various progressive organizations that would lead in the struggle for genuine settlement and integration of Filipino Canadians along the process of supporting the socialist movement in Canada and the global anti-imperialist solidarity movement.

Thus, the conference and the CPFC signify a landmark and a beginning of a new paradigm in our educating, organizing and mobilizing work.

Issued by the Conference Secretariat
May 15, 2010
Montreal, Canada

Gabriella Abis, using her skills behind the lens, placed the Top 10 slots of the City of Toronto’s “Our City, Our Stories powered by Canon” photography competition. Her series of photographs, “The Odyssey of Play,” were chosen amongst 152 submissions, all of which originated from Toronto’s list of Priority Neighbourhoods. “My photos convey a sense of happiness, friendship and freedom,” describes Abis. “Some of feelings are what our parents brought us to Canada for, not just for jobs,” she continues. Abis is a 17-year old student at Msgr. Percy Johnson Catholic Secondary School in Rexdale.

Kenneth Santos, a fourth year Political Science, French and Education major at York University, was the recipient of the Jaswant Singh Randhawa Award in Political Science. As a young Filipino scholar, he emphasizes the need for research that is grounded in the community. “We belong to a community of educators. Our experiences as a community shape our collective histories,” Santos says. “Our crucial role as young scholars starts when we document those experiences and bring it back to the community through collective action and organizing” he adds.

As members of UKPC/FCYA-ON, Abis and Santos encourage all youth to discover their creativity and talent through the practice of community-building. Education, art and culture are powerful components of the community’s transformation and empowerment. Armed with the culture of resistance, Filipino youth are stepping up to the challenge to make Filipino youth count in Canada’s future.

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To view more of Gabriella Abis’ photos, click here.

For more information, contact:
Kim Abis
(416) 519-2553
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org
www.magkaisacentre.org

In deepening our understanding of the Filipino Canadian community as part of a transnational community, internationally acclaimed writer and long-time women’s rights and human rights advocate Ninotchka Rosca will be part of this historic conference as a guest speaker. Rosca will help set the framework of our struggle as a transnational community in North America. She states that “migration is a life-altering process. Completion is as much a part of the migrant’s journey – completion of their lives, homes, families, communities and their value to society…and to treat it like a job application is really to insult and injure the migrant’s humanity.”

Unmasking and challenging the one-dimensional view that migrants and immigrants leave their country simply to “earn a living” regardless of the nature of work, Rosca will present the important role of progressive transnational Filipinos and their organizations to cultivate and nurture the path for genuine settlement and integration. Rosca states that “it is time to turn the word transnational into a noun – to signify those of us who are with more than one language, more than one culture, more than one history and certainly, more than one socio-political affiliation.”

Rosca will join progressive Filipino Canadians in supporting their assertion for full participation and entitlement in Canada and helping redefine the progressive movement and the role of the Filipino transnational community in social transformation.

A groundbreaking event in the history of Filipino Canadian organizing, “Counterspin” will show that Filipino Canadians are part of the dynamic transnational Filipino community in North America. “Counterspin” will define the role of progressive Filipino Canadians in shaping and mapping our community’s future within the context of neo-liberal globalization and imperialism. “Counterspin” will signify the beginning of the new era in the educating, organizing and mobilizing of the Filipino Canadian community towards advancement and development.

“Counterspin” will be held on April 30, May 1 & 2, 2010 at the Jewish General Hospital Amphitheatre Institute of Community and Family Psychiatry (4333 Cote Sainte Catherine, Montreal.

For more information or to register, visit the Kapit Bisig website at www.kapitbisigcentre.org.
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Montreal, QC – Excitement and anticipation builds as progressive Filipino Canadians prepare for “Counterspin towards a just and genuine settlement and integration” – a national conference that signifies the continuing struggle of the Filipino Canadian community for full participation and entitlement in Canadian society.

To be held on April 30, May 1 & 2, 2010 at the Jewish General Hospital Amphitheatre Institute of Community and Family Psychiatry (4333 Cote Sainte Catherine, Montreal), this landmark conference will be a monumental event in the history of the Filipino Canadian community, as we pave the way to cultivate and nurture the new path for genuine settlement and integration.

Building on the years of educating, organizing and mobilizing work of the Kapit Bisig Centre in Montreal, the Magkaisa Centre in Toronto and the Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver, progressive Filipino Canadians embrace this new era in our struggle with an affirmation to strengthen its unity towards the Filipino Canadian community’s advancement and development.

As we march forward in reclaiming our rightful place in a multicultural and multi-ethnic Canada, we call on all progressive Filipino Canadians to link arms and raise fists with progressive members of the community at this historic event. “Counterspin” conference aims to deepen understanding of our history and current situation as Filipino Canadians; to deepen understanding of the Canadian state and society and their role in helping shape our community’s reality; and to develop action plans toward just and genuine settlement and integration and to achieve full participation and entitlement.

To register or for more information about the conference, visit www.kapitbisigcentre.org or contact the conference secretariat.

In Montreal:
Kapit Bisig Centre
pwcofquebec@gmail.com; 514-678-3901
In Toronto:
Magkaisa Centre
pwcontario@yahoo.ca; 416-519-2553
In Vancouver:
Kalayaan Centre
pwc@kalayaancentre.net; 604-215-1103

April 30, May 1-2, 2010 will mark the days that progressive Filipino Canadians will, once again, galvanize their unity in a national conference called “Counterspin towards a just and genuine settlement and integration.” This landmark conference is the product of the strengthening unity amongst the progressive national organizations of Filipino Canadians including workers, women and youth and signifies the new phase in our educating, organizing and mobilizing work in the Filipino Canadian community.

For over 50 years, Filipino Canadians have struggled to settle and integrate in order to achieve full participation and entitlement in Canadian society. Three community centres working together, namely Kapit Bisig (“link arms”) in Montreal, Magkaisa (“unite”) in Toronto and Kalayaan (“freedom”) in Vancouver, have been in the forefront of these struggles. And once more, they continue to “ link arms and unite in freedom” to make this coming Counterspin conference possible.

To be held at 3755 Chemin de la Cote Sainte Catherine, Montreal, this national conference will bring forward our struggle for a just and genuine settlement and integration and declare our ongoing commitment to continue our legacy of resistance as progressive Filipino Canadians. This is also an offshoot of the 3-day national conference “Making the Filipino Community Count in Canada” held at the University of Toronto in November 2008.

Counterspin conference aims to achieve the following objectives:

• To deepen our understanding of our history and current situation as Filipino Canadians

• To deepen our understanding of the Canadian state and society and their role in helping shape our community’s reality

• To develop action plans toward just and genuine settlement and integration and to achieve full participation and entitlement.

As we forge unity towards our community’s advancement and development, Counterspin national conference is another milestone in reclaiming our rightful place in a multicultural and multi-ethnic Canada. Your participation and involvement during this conference will be a testament that we, as a community, are committed in overcoming economic marginalization, combating systemic racism and social exclusion, enhancing women’s equality and human rights and making the youth count.

Registration fee is $25.00. Register >>HERE<< For more information about the Counterspin conference, please contact the conference secretariat:

In Montreal:
Kapit BIsig Centre
pwcofquebec@gmail.com; 514-678-3901

In Toronto:
Magkaisa Centre
pwcontario@yahoo.ca; 416-519-2553

In Vancouver:
Kalayaan Centre
pwc@kalayaancentre.net; 604-215-1103

Toronto, ON – March 24, 2010 – On the evening of March 20, 2010, over 180 Filipino women, workers, youth and allies linked arms in welcoming the arrival of the much-anticipated Maleta (Suitcase) Project in Toronto. Entitled “End the Exploitation, March for Liberation: The Maleta Project Launch,” the multi-media arts exhibit and cultural show unpacked the Filipino-Canadian community’s maletas before the public, exposing their rich history of migration. With a particular focus on enhancing women’s equality, human rights and genuine development, the launch was a milestone event for the Magkaisa Centre’s organizing work with the community.

The exhibit featured art produced by the member organizations of the Magkaisa Centre: the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario; SIKLAB-Ontario (a Filipino-Canadian workers organization); and Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance-Ontario (UKPC/FCYA-ON). Drawing an overcapacity crowd of community members, academics, artists, trade unionists and members of other progressive organizations, the launch was a celebration of a unique form of creativity expressed with strong social content, setting the spotlight on a community that strives to define and produce a dynamic culture that is truly empowering and transformative.

The night opened with a song performed by Sinag Bayan Ontario entitled “Bangon Maria,” a call to women’s uprising and liberation. Joy Sioson, Chairperson of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario (PWC-ON) welcomed everyone as she announced the arrival of the Maleta Project in Toronto, ushering in another phase in Filipino women’s organizing towards full participation and entitlement in Canadian society. She also marked the day as the beginning of the celebration of PWC’s 10 years of organizing work in Ontario.

Messages of solidarity were read from the Kalayaan Centre in British Columbia and the Kapit Bisig Centre in Quebec, followed by a keynote speech from Cecilia Diocson, Executive Director of the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC). Diocson shared the journey of her maleta when she migrated in the 1970’s. “I only had one suitcase. Being a landed immigrant and a nurse, I knew what I had in my maleta – a dozen of nursing uniforms and nursing caps. I was ready for work,” she narrates, illustrating how the migration of the Filipino community in Canada has always been in response to the economy’s labour demands. For her, the maleta represented both the community’s history and its future as the 4th largest community in Canada. She encouraged the audience to unpack more maletas through documenting our women’s oral histories to further reveal the community’s inspiring stories of struggle and resistance.

Artist/Educator Marissa Largo shared her experiences and valuable insights as a community artist who works with women and youth in Toronto and in Montreal. She emphasized that the use of Participatory Action Research methodology in the art-making process is rooted in genuine community participation and driven by the passion for social change. “Everyone was involved in every stage, from the conceptualization to the art-making,” comments Mark Serrano, a member of UKPC/FCYA-ON. “As participants of the project, working and integrating with others allowed me to connect my personal experiences to our community’s common struggles.” He discovered that the true contents of the maletas were these actual narratives. “Otherwise, art without social relevance is hollow, like an empty suitcase,” he further states.

The closing remarks were delivered by Alleben Purugganan, member of the PWC-ON. Posing the question, “What do art and women’s liberation have in common?” She challenged dominant notions of freedom in a world where systemic barriers continually hinder Filipino women from achieving genuine equality. As both an artist and a community organizer, she described Maleta as a larger project of redefining culture – one that is for the people and raises a collective consciousness. “Art for the people is for liberation,” she emphasizes. The volunteers and participants of the project then returned on stage to perform a song called “Wavin Flag” expressing the community’s strength and their continuing struggle for freedom.

“Interweaved through years of educating, organizing and mobilizing, the Maleta Project not only makes our task of community building more fun and engaging but, more importantly, reclaims the central role of women as producers of history and innovators of creative expression,” explains Stephanie Sanchez, a UKPC/FCYA-ON and PWC-ON member. “We may not be what the mainstream perceives as artists, but the collective process allowed us to creatively harness our particular struggles and resistance. We were able to make art that our community can really relate to” she adds.

Many were impressed by the ingenuity and beauty of the art pieces, noting the clear conveyance of the issues that they shed light on. Topics ranged from the Live-in Caregiver Program, traumas of migration, family separation, racism and access to healthcare. The fact that people could relate to the Maleta Project is a testament to the effectiveness of the collective process through which the project was conceived. “It was so fun getting involved with something like this for the first time, especially when I hear people say how good and well-organized the exhibit is,” says Meryll Aguila, who is currently in high school and is one of the project’s participants. She continues, “ang gaan gaan sa pakiramdam pagkatapos ng pagod at hirap [It feels good after all that hard work]”

A groundbreaking and historic evening for the Filipino community, the night marked the beginning of the Magkaisa Centre’s seven-month long art and culture initiative. “The launching just gave us all a glimpse of the bigger and better things that will come out of the Maleta Project,” said Sanchez. The Magkaisa Centre knows Filipinos will continue to arrive with their maletas: there will be more stories to be told, and more battles to be fought. Sanchez states, “The Maleta is the story of our lives. It is the tangible manifestation of our assertion of making the Filipino community count in Canada.”

Members of the Magkaisa Centre are getting ready for another round of workshops, research projects and community mobilizations – together envisioning Filipinos as empowered members of this society. Members of the Magkaisa Centre concluded the night with the statement that ‘the Maleta project siginifies the beginning of a new paradigm for our community.’

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For more information:
contact Qara Clemente
416-519-2553
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org
www.magkaisacentre.org

Toronto, ON – March 17, 2010 – Going beyond tokenizing traditional cultural performances and culinary treats, the Maleta (suitcase) Project aims to sew the experiences of the Filipino community together to weave a history of Filipino migration to Canada. Titled “End the Exploitation, March for Liberation: The Maleta Launch,” the opening show will focus on the theme of enhancing Filipino women’s equality, human rights and genuine development. Works will explore the issues, the struggles and the resistance Filipino women have exemplified in Canada. “From over 20 years of Filipino women’s organizing in Canada and 10 years here in Ontario, we can’t keep silent about the experiences of Filipino women” states Alleben Purugganan, Maleta’s Project Coordinator. “We have to acknowledge that as a community, the exploitation that is happening and we need to strive for our just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada,” she continues.

The Maleta project was originally held in Vancouver, but has now come to Toronto through the work of the Magkasia Centre. Rather than just being an exposé of different experiences, however, it is highly informed by the analysis produced by the organizing, community building, and advocacy work of the Philippine Women Centres across Canada. PWC is also the first and only Filipino women’s organization established outside the Philippines here in Canada. March 20^th will be the launching of this project, but it is planned to be a long-term effort.

On March 20^th, 2010, the exhibit will run from 5:00 PM to 8:30 PM at the International Student Centre, University of Toronto. The show will begin with a cultural performance by the newly-formed Sinag Bayan Ontario and will continue with speakers from the PWC-ON. Joy C. Sioson, the chairperson of PWC-ON, will share some of the milestones of Filipino women’s organizing in commemoration of the 10^th year anniversary of PWC-ON. Sioson will be followed by a keynote address by Cecilia Diocson, the Executive Director of the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC), and speeches from artists and members of PWC-ON, Alleben Purugganan and Marissa Largo. Messages of solidarity will also be heard from members of the Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver, B.C. and the Kapit Bisig Centre in Montreal, QC. To guide the celebration, Aila Comilang and Danielle Bisnar, members of PWC-ON, will be hosting the fun-filled, informative night of mingling and art.

All are welcomed.

Please contact us about volunteering.

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“End the Exploitation: March for Liberation: The Maleta Launch”
Saturday, March 20, 2010
International Student Centre
University of Toronto St. George Campus
33 St. George Street
5:00 PM – 8:30 PM
Doors open at 5:00 PM, show starts at 5:30 PM

To confirm your attendance, please register:

Magkaisa Centre organizations:
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
SIKLAB Ontario (Advance and Uphold the Struggles of Filipino Workers)
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance—Ontario (UKPC/FCYA—ON)

For over two decades, we, Filipino-Canadian women of NAPWC, have been steadfast and firm in our call to struggle for the struggle of women from the South, whose lives and future continue to be battered by the violent impacts of neo-liberal agenda of globalization. We, Filipino-Canadian women of NAPWC, remain strong and clear in stating that the liberation of all women from the South, such as the Philippines, is integral and central to the overall liberation of women.

As progressive women, we will not accept that the future reserved for us is that of continuous exploitation and oppression as women of colour and as workers. We strongly refuse to be denied our right and full entitlement to call on all women to seriously look at women’s concerns from the perspective of class struggle, racial discrimination, gender oppression and the struggle of women from the South for national and social liberation.

While the imposition of neo-liberal agenda hammers the nation, as evident in the desperate moves of the current Conservative government, under Prime Minister Harper, to overhaul immigration and labour policies, to name a few, the intensity of its impacts is targeted and hammered directly onto marginalized women of colour in Canada, particularly on Filipino women.

The implementation of one of the neo-liberal agenda of Canada is evident in the rapid expansion of the Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP) and the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP). Preying on the desperation of Filipino women who are forced to leave the Philippines, Canada, through Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) perfected the LCP, its predecessor the Foreign Domestic Movement (FDM), and carries on sculpting the TFWP, in order to have a reserve pool of cheap labour to be utilized and disposed off when not needed anymore.

Touted by Canada as a “model” labour and immigration program all over the world, the LCP is a federal program that brings in thousands of women from the South, over 90% of whom are from the Philippines, to provide childcare and eldercare to upper-class and middle-class Canadian families. The LCP is Canada’s de facto national childcare and eldercare program.

As such, the LCP is a ploy of the current Canadian government and the previous governments, to distort and co-opt the concept of women’s equality and liberation. The LCP thrives on the blood, sweat and tears of Filipino women in Canada. Indeed, the “liberation and equality” of one group of women flourish from the exploitation and oppression of our women.

The LCP also serves as a fundamental pillar in the ongoing effort of the current Conservative government to reinforce and galvanize the privatization of healthcare and eldercare in Canada. It also serves to facilitate and perpetuate the modern-day slavery of Filipino women. It is an anti-woman and racist program that is fundamentally flawed and therefore, cannot be reformed, but rather, must be scrapped. To call for and accept any reforms to the LCP is not only a disservice to all women in Canada, but is to accept the role of being agents and brokers of the neo-liberal agenda of imperialism.

We have long been the prime targets of violence against women. With over 65% of our women forced to migrate due to poverty and joblessness in the Philippines, we are hit with the hardest and the most vicious blows and attacks of neo-liberal policies. It leaves us toiling in Canada. Everyday, we have to contend with the reality that as women workers, we are Canada’s top source of cheap labour. The most dirty, difficult, dangerous and low-paying jobs are reserved and have always been reserved for women from the South. The growing Filipino-Canadian community is a testament of that need for cheap, yet skilled labour. However, as we fill in the jobs that no other Canadians will take, the presence of Filipino women in Canada is marked by de-skilling and underdevelopment.

While we come to Canada carrying high-levels of educational attainment and professional achievement, our development is deliberately stripped away from us. We are systemically relegated to a lifetime of housework and domestic work. The transfer, of these ‘traditional’ roles of women to women from the South, not only undermines the overall women’s struggle for genuine development, but more importantly, perpetuates and condones the re-feudalization of Filipino women which further contributes to their underdevelopment as women, in a country that prides itself as a developed, industrialized nation.

Despite the celebration and achievements of IWD, we must not forget and should not ignore the plight of millions of women from the South. Hence, we, at the NAPWC, advance our call for genuine women’s solidarity where the centre of the struggle is according to the reality of the women from the South.

Thus, in celebration of IWD, members of NAPWC, marched on the streets of Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto and Montreal with linked arms and raised fists to advance the struggle for genuine women’s liberation. We also challenge all progressive women in Canada to forge genuine unity and solidarity with the struggle of our women.

As we strengthen our resolve to end the exploitation and march for liberation, the struggles of the oppressed, marginalized and working-class women must always be at the forefront of the struggle of the women’s movement.

Scrap the anti-woman and racist LCP!
Expose and oppose neo-liberal policies!
Down with imperialism!
Long live international solidarity!
End the exploitation, march for genuine women’s liberation!

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Organizations under the NAPWC:
Philippine Women Centre of B.C.
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
Philippine Women Centre of Quebec
Philippine Women Centre of Manitoba

Toronto, ON—March 10, 2010—Excitement builds up as the Maleta (Suitcase) Project draws closer to its launching date. Far from your average art exhibit, “End the Exploitation, March for Liberation: The Maleta Launch” will highlight art depicting the Filipino-Canadian community’s rich story of migration and resistance. Speakers and unique art works by progressive Filipino women, workers and youth will draw inspiration from the struggles and resistance of Filipino women to depict the theme of “enhancing Filipino women’s equality, human rights and genuine development.” While embodying an artistic flair without compromising a political punch, the night’s speakers, cultural presentations and art exhibit will show the creative capacities of the Magkaisa Centre in producing art that aims to be genuinely transformative.

An uplifting and inspiring debut performance by Sinag Bayan Ontario, the cultural arm of the Magkaisa Centre, will set the tone for the rest of the night’s program. Speakers from the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario (PWC—ON) will highlight the role of women as makers and innovators of their own history. In commemoration of the 10th year anniversary PWC—ON, Joy C. Sioson, chairperson of the organization, will share the history of Filipino women’s organizing in Ontario. A keynote address by Cecilia Diocson, executive director of the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC), will set the context of the need for the just and genuine settlement and integration of the Filipino community on the national level. As well, artists and PWC—ON members Alleben Purugganan and Marissa Largo will speak about role of art in achieving genuine women’s equality and liberation. Emcees Aila Comilang and Danielle Bisnar, also PWC—ON members, are expected to keep the crowd’s energy high through entertainment and education. Members of UKPC/FCYA—ON (Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance—Ontario) and SIKLAB Ontario (Advance and Uphold the Struggles of Filipino Workers) will also grace the night’s program of art and culture for the people.

Through the use of multi-media techniques, the art pieces in the launching exhibit weaves the stories of Filipino migration together into a unified assertion of the need for the community’s just and genuine settlement and integration. As the art pieces hope to convey, the wholesale empowerment of Filipino women is an integral aspect of the empowerment of the community as a whole. “Decades of Filipino women’s organizing have enabled the creation of these art pieces,” states Alleben Purugganan, member of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario and Maleta Project coordinator. “Women have not only inspired the creation of these art pieces, but it is their struggles and resistance that embody their very essence.”

The Maleta launch will mark the first of a slew of activities for the 10th year anniversary of PWC—ON. “The time is now for us to reclaim the role of art and culture in building our collective history as a people,” says Joyce Bondoc, PWC—ON member. “With the launch of the Maleta project, it’s certainly an exciting moment in the history of Filipino women’s organizing in Canada,” she continues. Participants and attendees are sure to walk away with a heightened awareness of the community’s struggles and legacy of empowerment.

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“End the Exploitation: March for Liberation: The Maleta Launch”

When:
Saturday, March 20, 2010
5:00 PM – 8:30 PM
Doors open at 5:00 PM, show starts at 5:30

Where:
International Student Centre
University of Toronto St. George Campus
33 St. George Street

To confirm your attendance, please contact:
Qara Clemente
(416) 519-2553
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org

Or leave us your information:

Maleta (suitcase): Project Launch
When:Saturday, March 20, 2010
Where:University of Toronto, International Student Centre (33 St. George Street)

Come and join us for the arrival of the Maleta (suitcase) in Toronto.  The project launching will showcase some of the work of our Filipino community members discussing and unraveling the journal of migration of  Filipinos in Canada.

Featuring: A keynote from Cecilia Diocson, National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada Executive Director, and speakers Marissa Largo and Alleben Purugganan.

Filipino-Canadians await the arrival of the Maleta (Suitcase) in Toronto

Toronto, ON – On Saturday, March 20, 2010, Filipino workers, women, youth, and their allies will gather in anticipation for the arrival of the Maleta (“Suitcase”) Project launch, signaling the beginning of a groundbreaking grassroots arts initiative that unpacks the community’s rich history of migration and community-building. Entitled “End the Exploitation, March for Liberation,” the project launch will spark a dynamic and creative way of depicting the community’s struggles and legacy of empowerment. The launch will take place a few weeks after International Women’s Day, highlighting women’s struggles and resistance through a multi-media arts exhibit and a live cultural show.

The Magkaisa Centre, a community centre that houses progressive Filipino-Canadian organizations in Ontario, takes pride in welcoming the escalation of Maleta Project to a national level.  Initially from the Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver, the project has served as an inspiration to all Filipino-Canadians to embrace the community’s culture of resistance. “This month, the Magkaisa Centre will carry forward a historic project that will creatively depict the rich history and stories of our community in Canada,” announces Joy C. Sioson, Chairperson of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario (PWC–ON).

John Nerier, a member of Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino-Canadian Youth Alliance–Ontario (UKPC/FCYA–ON) states that “the Maleta is our collective story. The project reclaims the power of art and culture in depicting the centrality of Filipino women’s issues in the struggles of the Filipino-Canadian community as a whole, and the resistance that Filipino women have mobilized to empower the entire community towards social change.”

The theme of “Enhancing Filipino Women’s Equality” shows the role of women as active creators and producers of their own history and innovators of various forms of creative expression. The night is one of the Magkaisa Centre’s first round of events to celebrate Philippine Women Centre of Ontario’s 10^th year anniversary. “Through art, we aim to bring the real struggles our women go through out to the rest of the community and to the mainstream Canadian society,” Aila Comilang, a member of PWC-ON and UKPC/FCYA stated.  “As women of colour who will no longer accept this ongoing marginalization and exploitation, we are taking on the active role of empowerment and in building a movement towards genuine women’s equality and liberation,” she continues.

The launch will feature an art exhibition created by members of the Magkaisa Centre. Live performances from the Sinag Bayan Ontario Cultural Collective and light refreshments will grace this evening of celebrating art and culture for the people.

“The Maleta Project launch is only the beginning in exercising the vision of an empowered Filipino community,” Sioson states. “We are more than just members of Canada’s multicultural mosaic. We are active participants who are entitled to our own voice in Canadian society.” Participants of the launching will get a glimpse of the Maleta Project, activities for which will continue throughout the entire year and will culminate in a final exhibit in October, in time for the 10^th year anniversary celebration of PWC–ON. The Maleta Project launch is yet another step towards the just and genuine settlement and integration of the Filipino-Canadian community.

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To confirm your attendance, please leave us your info:

No genuine national childcare until the Live-in Caregiver Program is scrapped, Magkaisa Centre organizations assert

Toronto, ON – February 10, 2010 – Despite a recent proposal by the Liberal Party to create a national childcare program, progressive Filipino Canadian organizations under the Magkaisa Centre express that the the ongoing exploitation and violence perpetuated by the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) renders the Liberal’s proposal an empty promise that falls short of genuinely fulfilling the childcare needs of all Canadians.

The Philippine Women Centre of Ontario, SIKLAB-ON (Advance and Uphold the Struggle of Filipino Workers) and the Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canda/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – ON are wary of celebrating the announcement made by Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff, and are instead calling for a critical examination of the proposal. Any initiative to create a national childcare program is not complete until the LCP, which the groups describe as Canada’s de facto national childcare program, is scrapped.

“What was not mentioned in Ignatieff’s recent announcement is the ongoing use of the LCP to meet Canada’s ever-pressing childcare and healthcare needs,” states Alleben Purugganan, member of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario. In order to lure Filipino women, who compose 97% of workers in the LCP, to migrate as domestic workers to fulfill Canada’s childcare and healthcare needs, Citizenship and Immigration Canada offers them the promise of citizenship upon completion of the program. However,ongoing community research and organizing work has revealed that three years of working in exploitative conditions under precarious status proves to be a heavy price to pay for attaining permanent residency. Working under the LCP for most of these women results in their deskilling, poverty and psychological trauma. “Our women are essentially being legislated into poverty through the LCP,” says Bryan Taguba, member of SIKLAB–ON For over two decades, Filipino women, most of them professionals in the Philippines, have been working in private homes as caregivers and nannies, while each political party has failed to create a national childcare program that genuinely addresses the childcare needs of Canada. Childcare in Toronto has been chronically underfunded by the Federal government, with the City currently facing $63.5 million in childcare losses.

For over twenty years, the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada, SIKLAB-Canada and UKPC/FCYA-Canada has been calling for the scrapping of the Live-in Caregiver Program, demanding an end to this ongoing form of violence inflicted on Filipino women and on the rest of the community. Such a comprehensive campaign prompts the elimination of the demand for cheap foreign labour to fulfill the childcare needs of mostly middle and upper-class families. If the Liberals are able to implement a national childcare program while allowing the violence of the LCP to persist, they are, in effect, creating the conditions for a two-tiered childcare system wherein a few families are sanctioned to continue the exploitation of Filipino women by hiring them as nannies. The three organizations stress that only through the scrapping of the LCP will a national childcare system be truly accessible to all Canadians, regardless of income or status. “While Filipino-Canadian women continue to work in poverty and while their children continue to inherit that poverty, we must question the implementation of a so-called ‘national’ childcare program,” states Purugganan. “A genuine national childcare must not only be accessible to all Canadians, it must also be able to benefit all Canadians, regardless of race, class or gender,” she continues.

Another fact overlooked in Ignatieff’s recent announcement, as the groups identified, is how the LCP also contributes to the increasing privatization of healthcare in Canada. Aside from performing childcare duties, workers under the LCP also fulfill healthcare duties for the elderly, the sick and disabled. Many of these workers are also healthcare professionals in the Philippines. As a shortage of nurses and the chronic underfunding of the healthcare system looms in the face of a current economic crisis, the LCP provides a cheap alternative for addressing Canada’s healthcare needs. The organizations foresee that the “implementation of a national childcare program, alongside the continued existence of the LCP, will continue to funnel Filipino women to work as private nurses and caregivers for the elderly, the sick and the disabled.” Moreover, community advocates have already pointed out that the privatization of care in Canada, both in childcare and healthcare, continually falls short of ensuring efficient and equitable treatment for all taxpayers. “As the private sector reaps the benefits of the privatization of care, it is the public who largely bears the losses of the private sector’s investments and risks. If the Liberal party will run on a platform of social justice in the next Federal elections, it must provide an explanation for the ongoing privatization of healthcare in this country,” Puruggan adds. She emphasizes that for the hardest hit working-class population, “this problem must not be tolerated and cannot continue.”

The healthcare system in Canada, in its current state, is riding on the backs of the Filipino community, with Filipino domestic workers, PSWs, LCPs and nurses bearing the brunt of the burden. Despite their contributions, these workers have been effaced from current history by a lack of proper acknowledgement and compensation. While Filipinos continue to be funneled into poverty, de-skilled and stamped with temporary status, no political party will get the attention of our community unless they address our fundamental issues and concerns. “We will not be treated as voting banks by the Liberal party while the needs of our community’s settlement and integration have yet to be met,” states Mark Serrano, member of the Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance–Ontario (UKPC/FCYA-ON). The continued existence of a government program that dehumanizes the Filipino community must be challenged and opposed by all Canadians. Scrapping the LCP is essential to the creation of a genuine national childcare in Canada, and to the future of the Filipino-Canadian community.

Magkaisa Centre organizations:
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
SIKLAB Ontario (Sulong Itaguyod ang mga Karapatan ng mga Manggagawang Pilipino sa Labas ng Bansa/Advance and Uphold the Struggle of Filipino Workers)
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance–Ontario

For more information, please contact:
Kim Abis
(416) 519-2553
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org
siklab-on@magkaisacentre.org
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org

Filipino youth, women and workers celebrate a night of resistance and empowerment

Toronto, ON – February 7, 2010 – Filipino youth, women, workers and allies, numbering over 150 people, raised their fists in unity and empowerment at Toronto’s first ever “Roots, Rhymes and Resistance,” entitled “Turning Up the Resistance!” The event was organized by Magkaisa Centre’s three organizations, and was held last December 12th 2009 at the Arbor Room in the University of Toronto.

It was night of cultural resistance expressed through poetry, hip hop, song and dance to “celebrate the active role we’re taking in advancing the community’s struggle in Canada,” says performer and event organizer Mike Yambao aka MC Lyrical Abstrakt. He explains that the participation of people from the different sectors of the community sharing the common aim of empowerment sets RRR apart from any other Filipino-focused events. From its humble beginnings at a café in Vancouver over a decade ago, RRR is a powerful means by which the community aims to take pride in their long and proud history of community organizing.

Members of the Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance–ON, SIKLAB–ON (a workers organization) and the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario (PWC–ON), the organizations under the Magkaisa Centre, are both thrilled and humbled by the overwhelming support they have received from the community. “The enthusiasm of volunteers, organizers and the crowd was inspiring. It felt amazing to see everyone, especially the youth, come together to explore our issues together through creative means,” states Aila Comilang, one of the night’s hosts.

Recognizing common struggles as racialized communities in Canada, solemnity and solidarity filled the room as the Macaw Hawk Youth Council opened RRR with a hand drum song and a hip hop performance. The rest of the night showcased a myriad of talents: from MC Dagamuffin, Dos Armados, Marylou David, and Beambeam de Pedro. Members of the Magkaisa Centre also sang a collective piece called “12 Years in Canada,” a song depicting the 12 years of struggle a woman goes through working under and after the Live-in Caregiver Program. High school students from Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Newman performed and volunteered at the event as well.

Now making up the fastest growing immigrant group in the country, Filipinos continue to remain within the fringes of the Canadian economic, political and civic life. Over the past years, the Magkaisa Centre has been educating, organizing and mobilizing the Filipino community towards a just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada. “RRR was a space where we creatively expressed our struggles as a marginalized community. Our shared stories of struggle have been the foundation of our art and cultural productions,” says Comilang. “When you think about it, it’s as if we’ve been collectively preparing for RRR all our lives,” she concludes.

Just recently, RRR organizers and new members met to set the stage for an even bigger, national Roots, Rhymes and Resistance in May 2010. RRR in May will also be part of the Centre’s year-long art and cultural program called the Maleta [suitcase] Project. As preparations come under way for Maleta and the upcoming RRR, the excitement and the positive response from the community speak of the need of more participatory and engaging initiatives – ones that not only explore the issues through dynamic and creative means, but also empower everyone to be part of a community that moves toward social change. As Yambao states, “Events like RRR is exactly what Filipino youth need to combat ignorance and apathy…I’m glad to have been a part of it.”

Toronto, ON – February 1, 2010 – During the November 2008 “Making the Filipino Community Count In Canada’s Future” conference, Toronto was honoured by the presence of several art works produced by the Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver and the Kapit Bisig Centre in Montreal. Most favourable were two pieces: a series of acrylic painted suitcases (mga maleta) titled the Maleta Family (produced as part of the Maleta art project) and Scrap: A Political Fashion Show. Through cartoon caricatures, The Maleta Family alluded to – visually – the harsh reality that Filipino families face coming to Canada, such as, but not limited to: the de-skilling of our community into service sector jobs and the deceiving nature of the Live-In Caregiver Program as an immigration program. Scrap: A Political Fashion Show presented the stories of Filipino caregivers through projection, audio voice-overs, and from the women themselves dressed in specifically “themed” gowns representing their challenges under a modern-day slavery program. In short, these works represent what the Maleta art project is all about: presenting the issues of Filipino–Canadians through the multi-disciplined medium of Art and through a community-based effort.

For the Magkaisa Centre, 2010 marks the beginning of the Maleta project in Toronto and also the 10^th year anniversary of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario. Maleta is not a separate program; rather, it is part of this celebration of 10 years of Filipino women’s organizing in Ontario. Unlike the initial Maleta project by the Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver, Magkaisa’s Maleta will be a long term project with monthly meetings – not just a series of workshops. Moreover, the Maleta project will be interwoven in all the projects of this celebratory 1oth year anniversary – including the ongoing Anti-Racism Education Research Project, International Women’s Day in March and the National Roots, Rhymes and Resistance in May. The project will include guests from Kapit Bisig Centre, Kalayaan Centre and collaborations with the Macaw Hawk Youth Council.

The main components of this project, however, will be the community effort to produce works that speak about the issues and connect back to the Filipino community’s need for a just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada. Furthermore, Maleta will encourage our community to continue deepening their understanding of Canada and our community’s role in this country’s future by focusing on four major concerns: Combating systemic racism and social exclusion; Overcoming economic marginalization; Making the youth count in our Community’s future; and, Enhancing women’s equality and human rights.

Art is an aspect of culture. For ethnic communities in Canada, multiculturalism has helped shape what that culture looks like and how it is consumed. In the Filipino community, it is a struggle to maintain Filipino culture and stop it from becoming merely entertainment. “We didn’t come here to dance for anyone. But, we’ll dance if we feel like it,” says Reuben Sarumugam, member of UKPC/FCYA–ON. The Maleta art project is a way for us to recognize our militant history from the Philippines, our history of women’s organizing here in Canada and an opportunity to carry on the legacy of our rich culture of resistance.

Magkaisa Centre Organizations:
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
SIKLAB Ontario (Sulong, Itaguyod ang mga Karapatan ng mga Manggagawang Pilipino sa Labas ng Bansa/Advance the Struggle of Filipino Workers)
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance–Ontario

For more information, please contact:
(416) 519-2553
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org
siklab-on@magkaisacentre.org
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org

The progressive Filipino-Canadian community organizations of the Magkaisa Centre greet this New Year with courage and determination as we advance the struggle for the just and genuine settlement and integration of Filipino-Canadians. Through our efforts in educating, organizing and mobilizing the Filipino-Canadian community, including advocacy work, policy engagements, political campaigns and more, we remain steadfast in addressing the needs of our community as we continue to face ongoing forms of oppression and marginalization in Canada.

Filipino workers, women and youth all across Canada are awakening to the challenges of community-building, and are prepared to confront all the barriers we face, whether in the form of racist and anti-woman policies such as the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) or in its direct effects on our daily realities as an economically marginalized peoples. In this new year of 2010, the Filipino-Canadian community still refuses to remain silent.

We recognize that while the Filipino community has been present in Canada for 50 years, we still continue to face barriers that impede our settlement and integration. Despite the growing presence of a large Filipino population, currently numbering well over 500,000, we are rendered invisible by ongoing forms of racism, gender oppression, economic marginalization and social exclusion.

We are asserting that Filipino-Canadians are far more than just economic units who contribute to Canada’s labour needs. We are makers and doers of our own history as a peoples in Canada. The Magkaisa Centre’s organizations, with the cooperation and support of organizations in Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver and and the Kapit Bisig Centre in Montreal, are strongly united in actively challenging the systemic barriers that dehumanize the Filipino community.

The ongoing expansion of the Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP), under the guise of legislative reforms by the Conservative minority government, keep us locked in economic shackles as we work in conditions that are akin to modern day slavery. As the shock of the current economic crisis deepens and permeates in the form of massive layoffs, cuts to the welfare system and the rise of regressive and divisive politics in all levels of government, those at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder, especially immigrants and working women, are the hardest hit.

With 65% of our community largely represented by women, we feel the immediate impacts of the economic crisis through lower wages, increasingly dangerous and casualized jobs, unemployment and worsening living conditions. The Filipino-Canadian community is not waiting for a bail-out package, nor are we likely to receive hand-outs from the government. The need for our just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada is ever pressing and always growing.

Central to this year is the celebration of the Philippine Women Centre of Ontario’s 10th year anniversary. As women, we are proud to celebrate a decade in the ongoing legacy of Filipino women’s organizing and resistance in Ontario. For over a decade, Filipino women across Canada have been struggling for genuine equality and liberation. This struggle has been marked with many challenges, as well as many gains, many of which have shaped the face of Filipino women’s organizing today. It is with the awareness of this history that we can empower Filipino women to take the necessary actions towards our emancipation and social liberation.

2010 will also see the launching of the Maleta Project in Toronto, a community-based arts project that aims to portray the story of our migration through the form of art. The Maleta Project focuses on creating art that is not only grounded in the community, but also aims to challenge our reality through collective and creative ways.

Building on the success of the launching of Roots, Rhymes and Resistance in Toronto, last December 12, 2009, Filipino youth will gather and collaborate with other Filipino-Canadian groups to celebrate our rich culture of resistance at the first ever national Roots, Rhymes and Resistance. Youth all across Canada are ready to address our issues through empowering and innovative ways. Armed with the culture of resistance, we are responding to the challenges of facing systemic barriers on a national level.

With even greater determination and fervor as community organizers, we are committed to carrying the struggle of our community forward in this New Year and onwards. We will not simply wait for piecemeal changes while the community continues to face systemic barriers in their daily lives. This new year, the Filipino-Canadian community will be relentless in bringing about the much needed change that we have always longed for.

With strong determination and unity, we will move forward to a bright and prosperous new year!
Magkaisa tayo, towards a just and genuine settlement and integration!

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Magkaisa Centre Organizations:
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
SIKLAB Ontario (Sulong, Itaguyod ang mga Karapatan ng mga Manggagawang Pilipino sa Labas ng Bansa/Advance the Struggle of Filipino Workers)
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance–Ontario

For more information, please contact:
(416) 519-2553
pwc-on@magkaisacentre.org
siklab-on@magkaisacentre.org
ukpc-on@magkaisacentre.org

Toronto, ON – On November 28th, 2009, members from Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance of Ontario (UKPC/FCYA–ON) gathered together for a one day conference titled Palakasin II: “Palakasin ang Ugnayan, Tuloy ang Laban! Filipino Youth Continue the Legacy of Resistance.” Over 50 Filipino youth, women, and workers forged their solidarity through panels and workshops that contextualized the community’s need for community-based action and resistance.

The first panel focused on our history of migration, along with presentations on Canadian Multiculturalism and the Temporary Foreign Workers Program. The second panel shifted the focus on violence against women and the experience of young Filipinos as workers and children of live-in caregivers. Aside from being a celebration of UKPC/FCYA-ON’s two-year history of community organizing, a resounding call for the community’s just and genuine settlement and integration in Canada also formed the core of the day’s activities.

Alleben Purugganan and Aila Comilang, members of the Magkaisa Centre, started off the day by welcoming all participants. Kim Abis and Mervyn Mabini then proceeded on to highlight UKPC–ON’s activities for the past two years. The past two years have been rife with activities, including Palakasin! ang Tunay na Ugnayan: Strengthen our Youth Unite for Freedom (2007), Balik sa Ugat, Balik sa Komunidad Workshop Series (2008), Filipino Women’s Studies Workshop Series (2009), and the beginning of the Anti-Racism Education Research Project (2009), to name a few.

In beginning, to address the Filipino community’s need for a just and genuine settlement and integration, it is important to examine Filipino-Canadian history and its ties to Canadian immigration policy. Qara Clemente of the Philippine Women Centre presented the history of Filipino migration into Canada, as related to Canada’s labour needs and the economic conditions in the Philippines. Following this, Reuben Sarumugam of UKPC–ON presented a slide show on the history of Canada’s multiculturalism policy. He emphasized the need to critically examine multiculturalism policy amidst the backdrop of immigration policies that have historically been racist, classist and gendered. He ended with a call to action titled “Moving Forward by Exercising Our Citizenship Rights.” He stated, “we have to exercise our democratic rights here in Canada, speak for ourselves and fight for our genuine settlement, integration and full entitlement in Canada.” Joy Sioson concluded the first panel by elaborating on the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) and the Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP). These government programs have direct, and often negative, impacts on the community, especially in the aspects of women’s equality, human rights and development, economic marginalization, systemic racism and social exclusion. Because of stringent work requirements, violent and abusive work experiences in the LCP and a lack of social infrastructure for the needs of these workers, programs such as the LCP and TFWP virtually legislate Filipino families into poverty. Furthermore, the impacts also trickle down to the youth, as live-in caregivers are separated from their families for an average of over nine years. “These are complex issues that must be matched with an even more comprehensive framework for action. It is the task of the new generation to undertake these tasks, while staying sharp and keeping in mind the interrelated struggles of combating systemic racism, overcoming poverty, making Filipino youth count in our future and enhancing Filipino women’s equality,” Sioson concluded.

While the first panel set the context for the history of Filipino-Canadians, the second panel focused on the stories of community members, whose lived experiences are a testament to the ever-pressing need for resistance. Edelyn Pineda, member of SIKLAB–ON, shared her experiences of working as a live-in caregiver. After paying thousands of dollars to a placement agency, she found herself stranded in Vancouver airport and without an employer; eventually becoming jobless in Toronto. “I am only one of many Filipino women who come to Canada through the LCP who find themselves going through the same traumatic experience. We have to question under what circumstances Filipino women are entering Canada, and how the LCP promotes these conditions,” Pineda said. She continues to speak out about her experience and questions the Canadian government’s interests in promoting the program.

Linked with the struggles of women in the LCP were its direct impacts on Filipino youth, as presented by Ken Santos and Bryan Taguba, both children of live-in caregivers and members of UKPC-ON and SIKLAB-ON. In particular, Santos shared his experience of empowerment after realizing how systemic structures, such as the LCP in Canada and the Labour Export Policy in the Philippines, had direct impacts on himself and his family. “Family separation happens when your family is working so much that they hardly see each other, your mother is still working as a nanny after finishing the LCP, and your brothers drop out of school because their Philippine education is not accredited,” he shared. Both Santos and Taguba see the importance of their role as youth organizers in tackling the issues not only of their families, but also for the settlement and integration of the community as a whole.

The second panel also featured Marylou David and Jarelle Gabison from UKPC–ON and the PWC–ON’s Young Women’s Collective. Both women emphasized the importance of incorporating the women’s perspective in organizing work and the significant role that young women play in leading a movement. Jarelle Gabison highlighted the significance of PWC-ON’s Filipino Women’s Studies Course in educating, organizing and mobilizing around the legacy of Filipino women’s resistance in the Philippines and especially in Canada.

The second half of the day continued with workshops on “The Role of Young Women in Organizing” and “Racism in the Workplace and Education System.” Discussions and actions plans around topics such as women’s resistance, the contextualization of men’s role in women’s liberation and the systemic aspect of racism were brought up. In the workshop on “The Role of Young Women in Organizing,” Kelly Botengan, member of SIKLAB–ON and former live-in caregiver, stressed the need to redefine feminism and the debates around gender for Filipino women. “Our struggles do not simply revolve around relationships and pay equity,” she said. Filipino women in Canada, a majority of whom are young women, are currently trapped in dead-end jobs and experience a lack of social and economic opportunities for expressing and empowering themselves. The workshop ended on a high note, with an emphasis on the rich history of Filipino women’s organizing and resistance in Canada.

In the “Racism in the Workplace and Education System” workshop, facilitators Jean-Marc Daga of SIKLAB–ON and Aia Furigay, a member of UKPC–ON, drew relationships between the different types of racism experienced by workshop participants. The participants’ collective experiences of racism pointed the need to link these experiences to systemic racism. Instead of personalizing and individualizing these experiences, it was important to connect them back to the racist practices embedded within institutions such as schools, the justice system, and the workplace. Anchoring racism’s root causes in something concrete allowed participants to see how they can begin to tackle issues that seem ambiguous. Overall, the youth were challenged to continue the work that has been done by Filipinos in Canada, especially by Filipino women.

The day’s celebrations concluded with a solidarity concert that showcased pieces that incorporated messages of resistance, collective consciousness and empowerment. Audience members found themselves listening intently and singing along to the performances that carried the themes discussed by everyone throughout the day. The night ended off with a round of assessments, where participants gave their insights on the event and shared ideas for concrete action. “Seeing youth gathering for a good cause with such passion and dedication was inspiring. It strengthened my belief that change can and will happen,” commented Joyce Bondoc, a UKPC–ON member.

Armed with the knowledge of their history, current reality and concrete steps for mobilization and action, the Filipino youth and community members who participated in this one-day event were united towards advancing the struggle of the Filipino community in Canada.

National Statement

January 20, 2010

January 20, 2010 – The mass and democratic organizations of Filipino
Canadian workers, women and youth of Kapit-Bisig Centre, Magkaisa
Centre and Kalayaan Centre extend our warmest feelings of solidarity
and support to the Haitian people and their families who have been
affected by the recent earthquake that devastated the entire nation
last January 12, 2010.

The 7.0 magnitude earthquake that killed more than 100,000 Haitians,
thousands injured and homeless, have left the entire nation grappling
with the loss of their loved ones and in picking up the pieces in the
process of rebuilding a nation. While we witness the tremendous
damages and impacts unravel as a result of this calamity, we also
witness the long-term impacts of the devastation brought upon to a
nation that has been battered by years of U.S. imperialist domination.
The ongoing implementation of the anti-people neo-liberal economic
policies perpetuated by the United States continues to batter Haiti,
leaving it to be “poorest country in the western hemisphere.”

As a community that shares similar struggles with the Haiti people
against imperialism, the forced migration of Filipinos is also a
result of the intensifying U.S. intervention in the socio-political
and economic affairs of the Philippines. As such, progressive
Filipino-Canadians heighten its fight to expose and oppose imperialism
in all its forms and its attacks on Third World peoples and nations.

Thus, while international aid pours into Haiti for relief, recovery
and rehabilitation, we also forge genuine international solidarity
with the Haitian people in their struggle for democratization as a
step towards the rebuilding of Haiti as a nation and as a people. We
oppose and are critical of the immediate deployment of over 10,000
U.S. military troops as part of the U.S. “relief efforts.” Such is
a clear attempt of the U.S. to further expand military intervention
and control towards the re-colonization of Haiti.

As we continue to learn about the ongoing struggles that Haitians
face, we also learn of the long history of resistance of its people
against slavery, colonialism and imperialism. In the spirit of
international solidarity, we extend our unconditional support to the
people of Haiti, particularly to the Haitian community in Canada. We
support their efforts to reunite with members of their family in
Canada and vow to continue to raise the Canadian people’s awareness
about the root causes of people’s common struggles all over the
world.

Long live international solidarity! Victory to the people of Haiti!

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For information, contact:

Cecilia Diocson, 514-678-3901

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Progressive Filipino women, workers and youth representing the aggrieved Filipino community maintain that the changes made on the federal government’s live-in caregiver program (LCP) announced by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) Minister Jason Kenney are yet another tactic to justify the continuation and expansion of modern-day slavery program, such as the LCP, in Canada.

The National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC), SIKLAB Canada (Filipino workers organization) and Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance (UKPC/FCYA) criticize these changes, which are purely technical, and strongly contend that the changes was made to make the racist and anti-woman LCP more palatable to Canadians in order to cover-up the systemic weaknesses inherent in immigration policies and to defend the ongoing overhaul of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA), such as the passing of Bill C50 and Bill C45.

The changes which were announced last December 12, 2009 in Toronto and Vancouver include extension of the period of being able to complete the live-in requirement from three years to four years; being able to apply for permanent residency after fulfilling 3,900 hours of work; elimination of the second medical examination when applying for permanent residency; employers covering the live-in caregiver’s travel and medical costs and providing signed contracts that clearly outline work hours, overtime, sick leave and vacation, and that live-in caregivers will be able to obtain emergency work permits within three weeks if they are abused.

“All these changes are only band-aid solutions. The announcement made by Minister Kenney unravels the hypocrisy deeply embedded in CIC. They do not genuinely address the exploitation and oppression of Filipino women under the LCP and will only make life more miserable to this group of already vulnerable temporary workers,” stated Cecilia Diocson, Executive Director of the NAPWC.

Since the implementation of the LCP in 1992 and its predecessor program the Foreign Domestic Movement (FDM), Canada has maintained and continues to uphold the stringent requirements of mandatory live-in requirement for 24 months within 3 years, temporary status and employer-specific contracts – the very fundamental pillars that set the context for the exploitative and oppressive conditions that these women are in.

For over twenty years now, Filipino-Canadians have been steadfast in calling for the scrapping of the LCP. However, for over twenty years, the Canadian government through CIC, has been adamant in its efforts to continue dehumanizing workers because of their status and in maintaining the modern-day slavery of women.

Amidst the slew of changes on the LCP, the NAPWC, SIKLAB and UKPC/FCYA contend that these reforms further expose the chronic crisis in Canadian immigration strategies and policies and the government’s failure to answer the much needed social services of its citizens, such as universal childcare and eldercare programs. The LCP is the de facto national childcare program and it is also being used to pave the way for the increasing privatization of healthcare.

“Minister Kenney is no Santa Claus to thousands of Filipino live-in caregivers,” Diocson continued. “These reforms are an insult to all Canadians because we have a government that fails to stop the violation of human rights of these workers and instead perpetuate violence against women,” she added.

Although many see this program as a way for Filipinos to enter Canada, the realities of the impacts of this program far outweigh the benefits of citizenship. Offering the prize of citizenship has been a classic tactic for CIC, as they dangle a “carrot on a stick” in order to attract and retain temporary workers to fulfill the dirtiest, most difficult and dangerous jobs that no other Canadians would take.

While the federal government was quick to recognize that many live-in caregivers work overtime hours and that under these new changes, they now have the option of racking up their hours towards permanent residency, the provision of being able to apply for permanent residency after completing 3,900 hours is a misnomer and a ploy to deceive live-in caregivers that their time under the LCP is shorter. 3,900 hours still amounts to two years of full-time, regular work.

“The 3,900 hours is no different from working 24 months. This is, in fact, another way of exploiting the cheap labour of these people that will only benefit the employers,” stated Roderick Carreon, National Chairperson of SIKLAB Canada. The mandatory live-in requirement places caregivers under the beck and call of their employers for 24 hours a day. Employers can easily deny the number of hours the women have worked and although they are deemed to be protected under federal and provincial labour laws, there is no way knowing what exactly transpires within the private sphere of the employer’s home.

Many women under the LCP work overtime hours for little or no pay, even after formalizing a set of rules about overtime hours on an employment contract, if at all. Despite the myth that caregivers are “members of the family,” the live-in requirement makes it more favourable to the employers to enjoy the cheap labour of these women.

Furthermore, extending the three-year deadline for completing the work requirement to four years will only lengthen the exploitation of live-in caregivers and lengthen the separation from their families. While CIC poses that this extension widens the window of opportunity for caregivers to apply for permanent residency and accounts for disruptions such as illness, pregnancy or job loss, this extension is a conscious effort on the part of CIC to have these women remain under the LCP even longer.

Presently, live-in caregivers wait 8-12 months to obtain their open work permit. This forces them to stay with their employers for the duration of the wait due to CIC’s processing delays and bureaucratic hurdles. In addition, the extension does not account for delays in paperwork, wherein employers withhold documents necessary for permanent residency applications, such as the record of employment, T4 slips, pay stubs, etc.

In addition, the elimination of the requirement to obtain a second medical examination when applying for permanent residency does not address the fact that majority of live-in caregivers’ ability to access healthcare is tied to their work permits. Many live-in caregivers, who are in between jobs and without valid work permits, are denied access to medicare, forcing them to pay their own health insurance and medical costs.

Carreon stated, “CIC must stop playing games with the lives of thousands of Filipino live-in caregivers. The reforms made on the LCP are a testament of the lack of political will in seriously addressing the demands of temporary workers to abolish the mandatory live-in requirement, to grant them permanent residency upon arrival, and the accreditation of their professional backgrounds. It is clear that the LCP is an employer-driven program and therefore will always be at the best interest of the employers and not the live-in caregivers.”

“A program that is inherently flawed and violent can not, will not and should not be reformed,” asserted Carlo Sayo, National Chairperson of UKPC/FCYA. “As workers, we should not allow Minister Kenney to pit us against each other,” he further stated. The reforms introduced by Minister Kenney is a measure to quell the escalating revelation of tremendous human rights and women’s rights violations that are legalized, authorized and stamped by CIC. Filipino women, workers and youth will remain vigilant in their struggle to end the exploitation and violence of these live-in caregivers as women and as workers.
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Contact information:
In Toronto: Magkaisa Centre, 416-519-2553; pwcontario@yahoo.ca
In Montreal: Kapit-Bisig Centre, 514-678-3901; pwcofquebec@gmail.com
In Vancouver: Kalayaan Centre, 604-682-3901; pwc@kalayaancentre.net