The President of the Ghana Federation of the Disabled, Mr. Yaw Ofori Debrah has called on Political Parties to feature Employment Policy for Persons with Disabilities in their manifesto as Ghanaians hearing to Parliamentary and Presidential election.
He said for some years now, PWDs are getting the opportunity to enter Tertiary Institutions and others are into Entrepreneurship and Apprenticeship but getting a job remains a challenge.
In an interview with Kofi Atakora, mybrytfmonline.com reporter, Mr. Ofori Debrah said PWDs also want to see Political party’s initiative to address Poverty among members.
According to him, most PWDs need some monthly allowances and Livelihood Empowerment against Poverty placement to survive.
Mr. Ofori Debrah called on Employers to find other alternatives for employees who become Disabled in line of duty and urged parents with PWDs not to ignore them but rather take advantage of government initiative in education and apprenticeship to enroll them.
The NPP Government has said it has implemented the increase in Common Fund disbursement to Persons Living With Disability (PLWD) from 2% to 3%.
It said the Disability Council in collaboration with the Ghana Federation of Disability Organisation, has drafted an Equal Employment Policy that seeks to address disability employment issues. 50%% of all toll booths are now manned by PLWD.
Under the Presidential Empowerment for Women Entrepreneurs with Disability (PEWED), we provided 850 female PLWD entrepreneurs with GH¢2 million to help them scale-up their businesses Under the Presidential Empowerment for Male Entrepreneurs with Disability (PEMED) an amount of GH¢2 million has been earmarked for 1,000 male PLWD entrepreneurs to help them scale up their businesses.
Meanwhile, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer, John Dramani Mahama, has promised to prioritize the processes aimed at addressing challenges faced by Persons With Disability (PWD).
The former President said this has become necessary following what he says is the reduction of the Disability Fund by the current New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration.
To solve this, John Dramani Mahama disclosed that PWDs will be allowed to form Boards of Trustees of their own to manage a special account for the disbursement.
“And so when we come, we are going to prioritize the disability Fund. We are going to create a Fund that will be separate from the DACF. When the DACF comes, the share of the disabled will be paid into a specialized account and they will have a Board of Trustees formed by the disabled persons themselves who will be responsible for disbursing that Fund.”
“50 percent of the fund will go as monthly stipends to disabled persons. The other 50 percent of the Fund will be invested in programs and projects that will benefit persons with disability but they will determine how they want to use their money,” he added.
Source: Mybrytfmonline/Kofi Atakora
