Aware: Short of $250,000 in funds

Aware: Short of $250,000 in funds

Lynn Kan

14 January 2006, Straits Times

Charity may have to cut back on programmes to help women in distress

MADAM Raja Saraswathy (not her real name) endured 10 years of assaults from her abusive husband.

Desperate for help, the 35-year-old administrator approached the Association of Women for Action and Research (Aware).

There, she received counselling, and a volunteer helped her make a police report and accompanied her throughout the court case to obtain a restraining order against her husband. While most people know Aware as a women's advocacy group, few know it is a registered charity that directly helps more than 3,000 distressed women a year.

Most, like Madam Saraswathy, are helped through its one-on-one counselling sessions.

The charity also operates telephone helplines and legal aid clinics. At the clinics, volunteer lawyers help women, who may not have the confidence or money to seek professional legal aid, to file for divorce or obtain custody of children.

Then there are befrienders, who are dispatched when necessary to support women in serious distress, help them make reports to the authorities and point them to the right family service centres.

However, Aware may not be able to continue helping these women much longer. The charity's president, Miss Braema Mathi, 47, told The Straits Times it does not have enough money to run all its programmes.

Aware needs $350,000 to run each year but all it has in its kitty is a paltry $100,000.

Big chunks of its operating budget also go to other activities, like helping women afflicted by Aids. In a joint project with Action for Aids Singapore, Aware is training volunteers to work on issues of safe sex and self-reliance.

'We need to give them more knowledge of sexually transmitted diseases and how they can help themselves and their family,' said Miss Mathi.

Aware currently raises funds through direct-mail appeals to donors and requests from charitable foundations.

It needs another $250,000 to operate its programmes this year, said Miss Mathi.

From today, the charity will hold a monthly jumble sale at the Aware Centre in Dover Crescent, selling clothes and electronic goods among other items. It hopes to raise more than $1,000 a month.

But Miss Mathi is realistic about how much this will help its coffers.

'It will probably be enough to cover one month's salary for one of our four staff, but every little bit helps.'

To raise more funds, the charity has started its Aware Training Institute, an initiative to train its speakers so they can charge for the numerous public talks they hold.

Miss Mathi has also had difficulty recruiting another full-time employee.

'The staff members working here do so much for very little or nothing in return,' she said.

The four staff work overtime and handle an overwhelming workload so Miss Mathi appealed to anyone who is keen to take up the challenge to come forward.

Aware is also appealing for more volunteers to help out during office hours. 'Our befrienders need to accompany the women we help to the courts and hospitals,' said Miss Mathi.

Aware also needs volunteers who can speak Tamil or Malay to help man its telephone helplines.

'Some people may think women in Singapore have arrived,' said Miss Mathi. 'But it doesn't mean there aren't women in a bad way. That's why we need people to believe in the work we do, and funds to continue our work.'