Make Buildings Accessible To The Challenged

The Vice-President, Mr John Dramani Mahama, has directed institutions responsible for issuing permits for public buildings not to do so for buildings that are not designed to make them accessible to the physically challenged. 

He said although the Disability Law had been promulgated, permits were still issued on buildings which had disregarded the needs of people with physical challenges. 

Mr Mahama gave the directive when he presented more than 100 wheelchairs and accessories to physically challenged persons in Tamale at the weekend. 

The items were donated by the Wheelchair Foundation based in the United States of America (USA) and the Rotary Club of Tamale to better the lives of the vulnerable. 

He recalled that the Mills government, after the passage of the law, directed that all public building should be designed to give access to the challenged, but noted that the directives had not been strictly adhered to. 

“I want to reiterate the directive by President Mills that those responsible for giving permits, as well as architects and designers, must make room for such buildings,” he stressed. 

The Vice-President expressed concern about how people, particularly schoolchildren, had to struggle on daily basis to gain access to public buildings and their schools, adding that “I therefore asked for the strict enforcement of that law.” 

Mr Mahama appealled to parents not to confine their physically challenged children to the streets to beg for alms, stressing that the role of such children was not to beg, but they should be allowed to reach their full potential in terms of education. 

He said education had been made free from the basic to the university level for challenged children and urged parents to take advantage of that gesture and send their children to school, stressing that “parents of the disabled have no excuse now not to send their children to school”. 

Mr Mahama noted that physically challenged persons had contributed a lot to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) hence the need to support their course. 

He said there were a lot of challenged persons who were contributing significantly to all sectors of the economy and stressed the need for the public “to change our perception about people with disability”. 

The Northern Regional Minister, Mr Bukari Moses Mabengba, commended the Rotary Wheelchair Foundation of Rotary International for the donation. 

He said his outfit was committed to harnessing all productive labour, including the physically challenged, in order to build a better Ghana, adding that no section or group would be marginalised in the society. 

The President of the Rotary Club of Tamale, Mr Joseph A. Mumuni, said the Rotary Club of Tamale and its partners had spent more than $1.6 million over the past two years in the areas of health, water and sanitation in the three northern regions. 

SOURCE: Graphic Ghana