Dear Editor – Examining whether the rights of persons with disabilities are being adequately acknowledged and met.
On several occasions last year, and indeed on numerous times in past years to my personal knowledge, calls were made locally to ensure the rights of persons with disabilities were accounted for in an inclusive and accessible way.
When marking Human Rights Day in late December last year, a breakfast was hosted in Honiara organised by the UN’s Development Programme’s (UNDP) Access to Justice Project, which focused on the importance of partnership and collaboration to ensure a wider reach of justice to all, including those suffering from disabilities.
At the breakfast, the UN’s Country Manager for the Solomon Islands, Mr. Berdi Berdiyev, said, “Here in the Solomon Islands, it is through the coordinated effort of our national partners that this translates into practical access to justice for people, particularly marginalized groups such as women, children and people with disabilities. We are proud to support the enhancement of justice sector coordination,”
While it is still comparatively early since the breakfast launch on the UNDP’s Access to Justice Project, I would be interested to learn how the proposed vision has been progressed through consultation with persons with disabilities and their representatives.
In March last year, a two-day “Disability Sector Collaboration Workshop” on accessing justice in the country was held at the Mendana Hotel conference room.
The then Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs Dr. Paul Mae, who gave his remarks at the event, encouraged participants to make use of the opportunity to share ideas and strengthen partnerships in addressing access to justice in this area.
“I would like to acknowledge the new UNDP project on Access to Justice who today will for the first time facilitate a two-day collaboration workshop in partnership with People Living with Disabilities (PWDSI),” Mae said.
The workshop commenced after the launching of the Solomon Islands Access to Justice Study report.
Participants from government institutions, ministries, stakeholders, and NGO’s attended the workshop.
Three members of PWDSI, including a representative from the Ministry of Health and Medical Services, made presentations.
The workshop’s objectives then outlined were:
To introduce the purpose, vision, and goals PWDSI and their projects for 2020 related to disaster risk reduction and access to justice and other DPOs;
Facilitate the sharing of policy developments within the disability sector and identifying collaboration with existing programs implemented by other development partners;
To enhance the knowledge and understanding of the CRPD and Incheon Goals within the Asia-Pacific Decade for People with Disabilities;
Facilitate the sharing of ideas for enabling increased access to justice and workshop development of legal clinic for PWDs and PSO;
Increase coordination across the disabilities sector by strengthening partnerships, and
Knowledge sharing of the Fiji experience of disability and social inclusion.
To what extent, if any, were the workshops’ objectives implemented and with what results?
In much earlier times, the Director of Planning and Policy at the Ministry of Health and Medical Services Mr. Ivan Ghemu, said during the National Health Strategic Plan 2016-2020, the Ministry would be directing attention to people with disability as a priority and would progress towards the improvement of services for the marginalised population groups, especially people with disabilities.
When delivering his keynote address at the time of launching the National Health Strategic Plan 2016-2020, Mr. Ghemu claimed that the setting of the “Honiara City” had failed its citizens who have a disability.
He said facilities such as roads, markets, hospitals, schools, transportation, and even government offices have no room for people with disabilities.
He described this as, “total negligence of inclusive development to accommodate the needed services and facilities for people with disability as far as the Convention of the Right of Person with Disability is concerned.”
At a later date, I commented that I could align, in part, with Mr. Ghemu’s views on there being limited access to premises with a disability and drew attention to the need for a local bank, at the time under construction, to allow for access to the premises for those using wheelchairs.
It is my understanding the building went ahead without providing a ramp for wheelchair access.
(Access to many places of work, shops, and banks still does not provide access for persons having to use wheelchairs in 2021)
Most recently, I drew attention in the local media to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations (UN) for the disabled in terms of education, growth in employment prospects, accessibility and the need for accurate data collection and monitoring of the (essential five) SDGs demanded by the UN.
I reiterate my call for the DCCG to do everything possible, with the aid of its partners and with help from the UN, to address the needs of persons with disabilities in the Solomon Islands, thus fulfilling the pledge given by the Prime Minister when speaking as the Guest of Honour at the Bethesda Disability Training and Support Centre’s 15th graduation ceremony.
The Prime Minister said, “In Solomon Islands, we will need concerted efforts between the government and different institutions and organisations to ensure better coordination in paying proper attention to this somewhat neglected section of our population.”
“Disabilities are a complex issue and whatever interventions are planned or designed to overcome their associated disadvantages will invariably be multiple and systematic depending on the context.”
Hardships of a physical kind are endured every day by persons in the Solomon Islands that suffer and are handicapped by disabilities. It is my hope that indeed, as the threat of Covid-19 recedes and goes away the aspirations and the rights of the local disabled will be given much more attention by the government with the help of donor and international welfare partners than former administrations have given in the past 23 years to my personal knowledge and concern.
Finally, in respect of aiding those former patients of the National Referral Hospital (NRH) still awaiting prosthetic limbs after having a limb surgically removed after contracting diabetes, the 20 ft modular building gifted to the NRH after an appeal I launched and handed over to the hospital to be used as a replacement rehabilitation workshop last September is still housed in the container it was shipped in from overseas.
It is my understanding that an extension was requested by the hospital authorities and plans, plus cost estimates drawn up, to provide for, additionally, a holding facility to accommodate psychiatric patients.
In effect, there is still no rehabilitation workshop to be used for the manufacture and custom fitting of artificial limbs for the 300 or more patients awaiting walking aids with a prosthetic leg.
I am told the plans and costing details for the extension of the modular building and psychiatric holding unit await hospital administrative approval before the work can begin.
Frank Short
solomonislandsinfocus
