Dr. Chike Okogwu, the executive director, Centre for Ability Rehabilitation and Empowerment (CARE) and the acting convener of Coalition of Disability Organization (CODO) has expressed his dismay over the Federal Government inability to implement Nigeria Disability Law in the ongoing fight against the spread of COVID-19.
Speaking on phone to Plus TV on their News in pidgin, Dr. Chike said that persons with disabilities are facing hard things in this period because Federal Government have failed to implement Discrimination Against Persons with Disabilities (Prohibition) 2018 which gives priority attention to persons with disabilities in a time like this. (Section 25 of the Act)
He informed that persons with disabilities(PWDs) were excluded in the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 and the resultant effect of this exclusion is that the best the PTF has done for PWDs is contracting the services of sign language interpreters in all their press briefings which only took care of the deaf, what happens to the needs of other clusters, the physically challenged, the persons with albinism, the blind and others. Their needs are not captured in the programmes of the PTF on COVID-19. The facilities at the treatment centres are they friendly to wheelchair users.
Speaking further, he said that poverty is the greatest challenge faced by PWDs and now that there is lockdown, how are persons with disabilities surviving? In this premise, CODO wrote to Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development and later the minister called us for a stakeholders meeting. They promised to share palliative nationwide for PWDs but that promise, there is only 5% chance that it will be implemented.
He argued that palliative is not enough to solve the challenges faced by PWDs. PWDs suppose to enjoy 5% of all social intervention programmes of Federal Government (CCT, Tradermoney, Farmers Money and many others). Federal Government through the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development mapped out 500 billion naira for social intervention programmes and 5% of it supposed to be reserved for PWDs. Imagine if they are implementing the Nigeria Disability Law which made this provision, PWDs should have 25billion naira channeled to take them out of poverty.
He commended Hon. Minister of State of FCT for the way palliative were shared to PWDs in FCT.
Federal Government as a matter of urgency should set up National Disability Commission to take care for the affairs of PWDs because if the commission is in place, all these interventions towards PWDs in COVID-19 would have gotten adequate attention. Not all these insults of giving few bags of rice to huge number of PWDs to share in the name of provision of palliative, he concluded.
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