KUCHING : Identifying self-potential is the best way for women to recover from the traumas of domestic violence. It is also the key to recovering self confidence and creating network and friends through things that domestic violence victims love to do.
This was pointed out by founder of Johor Empowerment of Intellectual Women Association (JEiWA), Nor Fadillah M. Nizar in an interview yesterday. She added that when women realised or re-identify their talents or skills, this is where they are reawakened as they could do more than just being stuck in a crumbling marriage. “Each and every one has a potential and with that they can do a lot of things.
In the past two years, JEiWA has looked back at its past programmes and we have come up with this format when conducting campaigns such as REDLIPS,” Nor Fadillah said. REDLIPS is a campaign to empower women who experienced domestic violence which is a brainchild of the federal Ministry of Women and Family Development.
JEiWA works hand-in-hand with the ministry and through programmes such as REDLIPS, both organisations will assist women in ways suitable for their lifestyles. “We in JEiWA add more content to programmes created by the ministry and we also segmentised our target audience and they are the middle to high income women. “We found that women from these classes tend to not participate in programmes that are intended to help them, mainly because they come from the corporate sector.
“It is because we specifically address this group of people that they now have a platform that they are more comfortable with in speaking out their problems with the same kind of mindset. “Plus, corporate ladies tend to opt for NGOs more because it has less bureaucracy and more independent,” said Nor Fadillah who is a Sarawak-born lady. She also disclosed that JEiWA works on three main elements namely forum, petition and survey.
“The third element being the most important to their programmes because it allows women to identify whether they are a victim of domestic violence or not,” she said. Nor Fadillah also plans to bring more JEiWA programmes to Sarawak in the future and hopes that more partners and companies are willing to collaborate with JEiWA in engaging victims of domestic violence in Sarawak.
