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"The Estrada administration's pro-VFA stance is anti-women as this virtually endorses the sale of Filipino women and children to prostitution. This contradicts President Estrada's 'pro-people' posturing, a clear indication that he is no different from the past administrations". This was the statement made by Liza Largoza Maza, secretary general of GABRIELA regarding President Joseph Ejercito Estrada's position favoring the Visiting Forces Agreement.
GABRIELA together with other organizations under Bagong Alyansang Makabayan
(BAYAN) held a press conference in Quezon City to denounce the current administrations'
endorsement of VFA. US Ambassador Thomas Hubbard had been lobbying for its approval
in the Philippine senate.
The militant women's group said " the presence of US foreign military personnel
almost always result in an increase of prostituted women and children, especially
in the context of widespread poverty."
Before the US military bases pull-out, Olongapo City, site of Subic Naval Base, registered more than 330 bars, blubs, massage parlors and entertainment joints along Magsaysay Ave. alone. "Entertainers" in Olongapo reached a peak of 32,000 during this period.
GABRIELA also stressed that the Immunity Clause on the VFA "safeguards US military personnel but not the women and children they violate". They cited fifteen cases of sexual abuse involving children aged 11 to 16 years old and 82 cases involving young women aged 16 and above filed against US servicemen between 1981 to 1988 which were all dismissed. These are only the official documented cases while many more went unreported.
"Even before the elections, President Estrada has already sold out the sovereignty of the country and consequently sold the lives and dignity of our women and children by backtracking on his earlier anti-VFA stance in exchange for the support of the US government for his presidential bid," added Maza.
