MONROVIA – Moving up the staircase (entry point) of the MUREX PLAZA, in Sinkor, Monrovia, some groaned or grunted on bodily pains from walking with crutches scrapping their bare skin and exerting ng pressure on their bones under the flesh.
Report by Samuel G. Dweh, Contributor
They had a common mission here: to attend a seminar for deliberations on decades-old issues that have been causing psychological, emotional and physical pains in them. They are members of Liberia’s persons with disabilities, abbreviated PWDs.
The date is Friday, November 30, 2018—two days to the celebration of the International Day for Persons with Disabilities (IDPD)
“We have gathered her to discuss issues concerning employment and empowerment of persons with disabilities in Liberia,” the Executive Director of the National Commission on Disabilities (NCD), Mrs. Ricardia B. Dennis, said to a group of persons in the Conference Room on the 6th floor of the Murex Hotel located on the 10th Street. She added: “On the third day of December, 2011, UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon said, I quote, ‘Development can only be sustained when it is equitable, inclusive, and accessible’.”
To prevent digression in the main discussion by any of the participants, the NCD head chose, as a guiding general topic, “What Can We Do for PWDs to be employed and Empowered?”
A PWD, Mrs. Dennis, a government official, said lack of practical interest by Government’s Ministries responsible for issues concerning PWDs and dishonesty by some persons in the hierarchy of advocacy groups of PWDs are the main causes for the continuance of economic hardships PWDs are in. She mentioned the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection as Government’s Ministries with more responsibilities for PWDs.
“Government officials who do not have any disability do not understand our language of economic constraints,” Mrs. Dennis said about her colleagues in other governmental sectors.
On PWDs being a cause of their own problem, NCD’s E.D. mentioned misuse of subsidies from national government by beneficiaries (disabled persons).
“Disabled persons who had received the subsidies hate to be monitored by the source of the monies, to know how they had used the subsidies,” the businesswoman-turned-government official pointed to one of the PWDs’ self-inflicted hardships.
But some participants narrated personal economic success stories or of other PWDs in various business ventures.
“Mr. Samuel Outland, currently based in Rivercess County, is one of the popular PWDs properly using their subsidies from the Government,” Madam Naomi B. Harris, president of the National Union of Organizations for the Disabled (NUOD), interjected. NUOD is the national advocacy (CSO) body of Liberia’s PWDs. “Many other business persons in the County, and many some government officials come to Mr. Outland for loan.”
Mr. David Hne Wallace boasted about his building construction Firm, ERAMITOE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, for thriving in a competitive business environment where abled-bodied persons are favored by majority of people.
“When you are at my company other people living in the area will not say to you, ‘the owner is a person with disability’,” Mr. Wallace bragged a grined.
Ms. Sandra Flomo, age 31, physically disabled, president of the Christian Association of Physically Disabled (CAPD), talked about her fast-growing enterprise that began with subsidies she received couple of years passed. “Many of the other business people around me tell me, I’m making medicine to make my business grow faster. When my husband was not having a job, it’s money from this business that saved his life,” she explained.
Mr. Bill S.K. Jallah, a physically disabled broadcast journalist, writer, teacher, spoke about his booming non-commercial agricultural organization—Cultivation for User Hope—that trains farmers, set up ‘farm clubs’ in High Schools and produce agricultural books for schools.
“I got the inspiration in Ghana, where persons with disabilities are more united and most of them survive on their talents and skills, unlike those in our Country,” he noted.
Giving story of his ability, Mr. Jallah said he was diagnosed of Bipolar Disorder in 1976 and went into relapse in 1985 when he was working at the ELWA Radio, which caused his pre-mature retirement by the Station’s owners.
Speaking through Mr. Matthew T. Bobowtie, an interpreter in Sign Language, the Deputy Director of Technical Services at NCD, Mr. Joshua Bull, said Sign Language tutors’ presence at the Starz (Computer) Institute (based in Monrovia) is responsible for excellence performances by hearing impaired students at the Institute.
“One of the deaf students took first-place position at the end of the academic year,” Mr. Bull reported.
Some participants disclosed political or ideological cracks in the advocacy bodies of Liberia’s disabled community, and between NUOD and NCD.
“There are strong divisions in these groups and between some. Don’t be mute about these problems,” Mr. Kutaka Devine Togbah, Director of Human Rights and Protection Division at the Ministry of Justice, said.
Mr. Daniel N.O. Dagbe, 2nd Vice President of NUOD, remarked on another rift. “NUOD and NCD have long-standing issues. Until these issues are resolved, we will never make headways,” he remarked.
The Seminar ended with several suggestions and an Action Plan. Two are: A meeting between NCD and NUOD, scheduled for Friday, December 7, 2018; and a Donor Conference on Subsidies to be held on the 7th day of December, 2018.