Centre decries non-implementation of PWDs law in Edo two years after passage

The Centre for Citizens with Disabilities, CCD, has decried the non-implementation of the Persons With Disabilities law in Edo State two years after the bill was passed into law.

CCD decried the non-implementation of the law passed in July 2022 on Tuesday during a training for persons with disabilities on rights advocacy and advocacy action plans in Benin City.

The training, themed “Promoting Inclusive Economic Opportunities and Community Resilience for Persons with Disabilities,” was organised in collaboration with Project Enable Africa with support from the US Alumni Engagement Innovation Fund.

Acting Director of CCD Godwin Unumeri, speaking during the training, said people with disabilities, PWD, in Edo have not advocated enough to push for its implementation.

“We came here with the mindset that Edo does not have a law that guarantees the rights of the PWDs in the state. We only just got to know from them now that a law has been passed to that effect but has not been implemented in the state. What I can say is that the people who advocated for the passage just sat down and watched after the passage of the law.

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“Today’s workshop will expose them to the knowledge of advocacy that will help them push issues in the disability law that have been passed and help them articulate themselves in going about the advocacy.

“PWDs have material and human resources within themselves that they are not utilising. So this training will help the various disability clusters know that they need to work together to achieve their advocacy objectives,” he said.

Unumeri added that the training was geared towards building PWDs to be economically resilient to identify advocacy issues.

He also added that the training would build PWDs’ capacity to understand the content of advocacy, advocate corporately and insist on their rights using disability models to avoid distractions.

He noted that it would also expose participants to the fact that rights-based advocacy is advocacy for the rights of PWDs on the understanding that persons with disabilities are entitled to their rights as contained in the national disability law.