ELIZA TITA LUBI began her career in human resources management and development thirty five years ago. When she decided to pursue grassroots community development and human rights advocacy, she had already established a reputation in her field having been at twenty eight one of the youngest female personnel managers in the industry, in an American company employing more than a thousand nationwide.

      Taking some university courses at the time martial law was declared in 1972, she became "sick and tired of police arrogance and brutality." Her experience in being acosted and her car checked every time she drove all the way from Makati to the UP campus led her to join a discussion group consisting of young executives and other middle class professionals who would meet weekly to discuss the political crisis in the country. before this, of course, she was constantly upset at watching the police beat up young student activists during rallies.

      With this gradual iummersion into activism, she later quit her job to be a full time organizer in rural communities. She helped organize, educate, and mobilize peasants, especially women, against the Marcos dictatorship.

      For these activities she was twice arrested and detained.

After the overthrow of the dictatorship, of which she had taken an active part, she used her human resources management and development knowledge and skills to contribute to the capabilty building of women's and other people's organizations. She also mobilized middle class professionals to support rural and urban grassroots women and men.

She developed and conducted the BAsic NGO Management training module. This was the first of its kind developed toward capability building of people's orgnizations and NGOs. She also led the team that dveeloped the Basic Bookeeping training module for cooperatives, POs, and NGOs. This training was found necessary so organizations could optimize and better handle their limited finances and other resources.

In 1988, she was again arrested and detained, first at the Tondo Police Station and later at the Manila City Jail. She was elected Mayora for the brigada of more than a hundred female inmates. If she had not been released , she would have been elected as Moayor of the whole city jail with a total of 2,000 inmates. Even in jail, her leadership showed by her instituting reforms and getting concessions from prison authorities.

After her release, she joined the Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM). She got a scholarship to attend the special Development Management Program at the Asiam Institute of Management (AIM). She finished on top of her class and was one of the few given a certificate for 'superior performance.'

Afterwards, she designed a Social Marketing workshop and futher developed and expanded the Basic NGO Management training module. She conducted workshops for PRRM's community organizers, supervisors. and first-line managers. The training was also offered to other NGOs for whom she also served as Organization Development (OD) consultant from time to time.

She joined the women's movement by being a volunteer in Gabriela, which had been instrumental in her release from jail through a "Free Tita Lubi" campaign here and abroad. She became the National Coordinator of the Gabriela Commission on Women's Political Rights and a member of the founding Board of the Women's Crisis Center.

In 1933, she was elected to Gabriela National Council and eventually to its National Executive Committee ans International Relations Officer. This was the period when she developed the Conflict Resolution for Women module. This again was the first of its kind and was adapted from a Feminist Management Training Seminar conducted by two Dutch feminists.

Tita was also elected to the National Executive Committee of Bayan as Treasurer. She is still a member of the Board of Trustees of SELDA, the organization of former political prisoners that has been awarded compensation damage from the Marcos ill-gotten wealth.

She helped set up and is Vice-Chair of KODAO Productions which produces the well awarded daily radio program Ngayon Na Bayan on DZRJ. KODAO has also been cited for its video documentaries covering social issues.

She is presently Vice-Chair of the Gabriela Women's Party, a national sectoral party formed to enhance women's role in the legislative process, where women can strive for reforms and become part of the political process. This new field compliments women's actions in the parliament of the streets.

She has been a speaker, resource person, and delegate to numerous forums, seminars, workshops, and conferences both here and abroad to such places as Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, the U.S.A., Italy, Denmark, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.

Her expertise and activism are recognized especially in Asia, having served variously in international steering, organizing and coordinating committees. She has acted as convenor, moderator, and presiding officer or member of the presidium in different meetings, assemblies and fora in the past fifteen years.

We hope to hear more from Tita Lubi in the future, as her personal advocacy is "women in politics, so they can have a louder voice and greater impact on the affairs of the state."

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Ofelia Gelvezon-Tequi '59

Dr. Priscilla C. Sanchez '55

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