Bangkok bus authority makes buses safe to travel for women and girls

The UN Women, which is shortened for the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, said the BMTA joins the campaign by training its staff on techniques to deal with incidents, encouraging passengers to not accept and speak out and preventing them.
The BMTA has identified seven forms of sexual harassment prevailing on public buses: unexpected touching, taking liberties, rubbing with private parts, indecent exposure, staring, making passes and pestering, according to the press release from the UN Women.
This harassment can be more likely when buses are congested and so encouraging passengers to be vigilant and to know how to intervene to prevent these assaults is important for the BMTA.
Serving three million commuters per day, the BMTA and the Teeranat Kanjanauksorn Foundation have worked on the “Pineapple Eyes” project to provide BMTA staff with a better understanding of sexual harassment and tools to address it. Through this partnership, 500 of 14,000 BMTA's staff at eight bus districts in Bangkok and its vicinity have received training.
From Wednesday, the BMTA will continue this work in commemorating the International day for the Elimination of Violence against Women when it joins with UN Women and the Teeranart Kanjanauksorn Foundation to raise awareness for preventing sexual assaults on public buses, in support of the UN Secretary-General’s UNiTE Campaign to End Violence against Women.
The BMTA will also release some 10,000 stickers, pamphlets and video clips to help effort to end sexual taunts.  As a result of this outreach “Bus drivers and conductors, who are at the frontlines, will be better equipped with deeper understanding and practical techniques to ensure safety of all women travellers,” BMTA Director Opas Petchmunee said.
One main priority of UN Women which works to secure gender equality and the advancement is ending all forms of violence against women and girls. “Ensuring that public spaces are safe is especially important for women’s access to their human rights,” said Roberta Clarke, Regional Director of UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific and Representative in Thailand.