SENATOR NINA OF SULU TURNS 84 The Teacher who Fought the Battle to Read This Peace Month, we remember a model and the lone lady Muslim Senator ever. The first lady Mindanawan senator Santanina “Nina” Rasul turns 84 this week and she is still a beauty and belle who travels. She dreamt that Sulu would one day rise above the ashes left by the “burning of Jolo” in 1968, when military and the newly formed MNLF clashed. She surrounded herself in the world of ideas and books of her superintendent father to escape the bitter bangs of bullets around her. Many of the Tausugs had stopped schooling. But Rasul wanted learning for everyone so she taught the older people to write and read, later founding the Magbasa Kita (Let us Read) Foundation. In 1987, Cory Aquino urged her to run for Senator. As a politician, Rasul pushed for historic laws such as the Women in Nation-Building Act and women being allowed enrolment at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA). “Nina” Rasul, the island girl, graduated Cum Laude in A.B. Political Science from the University of the Philippines. She was a favorite model of now national artists Napoleon Abueva and Ireneo Miranda. She returned to Sulu and became a public school teacher (1952 to 1957) where she taught among others, MNLF chairman Nur Misuari. While Nina devoted herself to becoming a fulltime wife and mother, she spent her free time serving her community. Her husband, the late Ambassador Abraham Rasul, also believed in public service. Disturbed by the high levels of illiteracy in the Muslim communities, she developed an effective literacy methodology in the 60s, Magbassa Kita (Let Us Read). This has been implemented by the Department of Education as a national literacy program. She founded the Magbassa Kita Foundation, Inc. which has trained about thousands of literacy teachers nationwide and taught senior citizens how to count. In 1990, she was appointed Honorary Ambassador of UNESCO during the International Literacy year. A liberal Muslim husband, Abe encouraged his wife to give in to the clamor of their community run for office. She was elected barrio councilor at Moore Avenue, Jolo, Sulu (1960-1963). Later, she would be the first Tausug woman elected Provincial Board Member (1971-76). She was appointed a Commissioner representing Muslim and other ethics minorities in the National Commission on the Role of Fiipino Women from 1978 to 1987. The first Muslim woman elected Senator, the only Muslim elected Senator for two terms (1987 and 1992), she is unfortunately also the last Muslim Senator. Nina authored eight laws as Chairperson of the Senate Committee on Civil Service and Government Recognition and the Committee on Women and Family Relations. She received the WOMEN’S GOVERNMENT (GO) AND NON-GOVERNMENT ORGANIZATION (NGO) NETWORK AWARD, for her comprehensive legislation for the promotion of women empowerment, specifically RA 6949 – making March 8 as National Women’s Day; RA 7192 – Women in Development and Nation Building Act which removed vestiges of discrimination against women, opened the doors of the Philippine Military Academy to women. Nina received THE GOLDEN HEART PRESIDENTIAL AWARD in 1998, “for her diligent efforts in reconciling contentious positions of both the government and the MNLF during the last phase of the peace negotiations in 1996, culminating in her active involvement in the formulation of the Final Peace Agreement which ended hostilities between the two parties”. After leaving the Senate, she has focused her energies on organizing Muslim Women Peace Advocates, the education of Tausug youth and Magbassa Kita. Read more mindanews/c54-my-my-my-marawi/2008/03/11/my-my-my-marawi-mindanao-women-who-aimed-high-by-samira-a-gutoc/
Posted on: Wed, 10 Sep 2014 22:46:03 +0000
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