By Julianne Edon Gabis
All throughout history, women have been denied of entry to fields traditionally held and dominated by men. Not only until the beginning of the 20th century, politics was no place for a woman- nothing less than the confines of her kitchen.
The history of women in politics began in 1937 when Filipino women obtained their right to vote via plebiscite with a required threshold of 300,000 yes votes. Women suffrage won a landslide victory of 447,725 yes votes versus 33,307. This paved the way for a change in the landscape of Philippine Congress.
Elisa Rosales-Ochoa joined the 1941 congressional elections in the Agusan province and won through a landslide victory. This cemented her name in history as the first ever congresswoman in the country.
Born and raised in Butuan, what was then the province of Agusan, she was a licensed nurse prior to her career in politics. She passed the civil service examination for nursing superintendents and went off to law school in 1939. When the Filipino women were granted the right of suffrage, Ochoa interrupted her law school studies to run for a position in the National Assembly.
Many Filipino men were opposed with the idea of women having rights to vote and run for office. The primary concern was the destabilization of familial dynamics if women formally started to be included in the running of the country.
Gender discrimination is such an old element in our country that it traces back to the colonial era with the church’s involvement in regulating sexual conduct of women. Given
such conditions back then, acts and laws prioritizing women welfare were limited.
A month into Ochoa’s term, World War II broke out but her service did not halt as she led other nurses in attending to Filipino and American soldiers wounded in the war. After the war, she authored Commonwealth Act 704- an act to establish municipal maternity and charity clinics in rural areas.
Women in far-flung areas up to this time have been given minimal healthcare during their maternal period. Mortality rate of pregnant women was staggering. As a medical practitioner herself, Ochoa saw the urgent necessity of addressing the healthcare needs of poor pregnant women in these rural places.
These maternity and charity clinics shall attend to indigent patients certified as such by a municipal treasurer. The act also established proper compensation of physicians that attend to these patients.
Ochoa’s term concluded in 1946 but her public service did not stop as she worked as a technical assistant on health to former presidents Ramon Magsaysay and Carlos Garcia.
In recognition of her leadership achievements, she was given acknowledgments and proclaimed as a model citizen of Agusan del Norte.
From her time as the first and only woman in Congress, women remain a minority in the House of Representatives up to now with the current Congress (17th Congress) having only at least 87 women, 6 more than the previous one.
But with Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo attesting to the brilliance of empowered women and their capability to lead, there may be a change in that fact not long from now.
