The Center for Citizens with Disabilities, CCD, has called on government at all levels to develop and implement budgetary policies that would consider the welfare and plights of Persons Living With Disabilities, PWDs.
Newspot reports that the Acting Director of the Center, Mr Godwin Unumeri made the call on Wednesday at a training workshop for Persons with Disabilities on rights advocacy and advocacy action plan.
Unumeri, who spoke on the topic, “Disability-inclusive budgeting”, said that state governments must ensure that PWDs were carried along in their budgets right from planning to implementation stages.
He noted that governments must ensure that their respective budgets make provisions for easy access to all public infrastructure.
According to him, “as of today, there is a gap, the prejudice is still there. The various state governments have to address these gaps. They must ensure that budgets address the way it will affect persons living with disabilities.
“Budgets that are PWDs-inclusive must need to involve them right from the planning stage to the implementation.
“Budget is a tool that affects your lives. But gets that is PWDs-inclusive needs to involve you right from planning to the implementation.
“If you leave it to the governments alone to do, they might be inclined to budget for only those visible to them at the planning stage.
“Ensure that budgets make provisions for accessibility to all public infrastructures. Insist that everything you need is included in the budget, “he said.
He, however, charged members of Joint National Association of Persons with Disabilities, JONAPWD, to press for budgets that put them into consideration.
Meanwhile, Unumeri, lamented the lack of a comprehensive database for persons living with disabilities, PWDs, in Edo State.
Newspot recalls that the Center had on June 25, 2024, decried the non-implementation of the PWDs law, two years after the bill was passed in the state.
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