The Ghana Federation of Disabled Organisation (GFD) has called on Parliament to ensure that key provisions in the Persons with Disability Act 2006 are implemented to improve conditions of persons with disabilities, reports News Ghana.
“The passage of the Act 715 seems irrelevant because it has not added any significant impact or improvement into the lives of persons with disabilities” said Ms Sirina Mahamadu, the Bono Regional Vice President of the Federation
This is because successive governments have not demonstrated any political will and failed in its implementation since Parliament passed the Act in 2006.
The Persons with Disability Act, 2006 (Act 715) makes it mandatory for all buildings to which the public has access to be fitted with disability-friendly facilities to make them accessible to persons with disabilities; this is the sole responsibility of the owner or occupier of such buildings.
Apart from that, she said, Ghana had also been a signatory to the UN Conventions on the Rights of People with Disabilities for decades, but the nation has failed to implement protocols in the convention which seeks to improve the living conditions of persons with disabilities.
The meeting was organised by the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA-Ghana), in partnership with STAR-Ghana, under the Gender Inclusion and Voices on Equality Sustained (GIVES) project.
She said disability was not inability and there is the need for persons with disabilities and the GESI groups to find something worth doing to enable the assembly to support them.
