Disability sector voices frustration at National Dialogue for inclusion

IOL News

20 hours ago

President Cyril Ramaphosa addressing delegates at the opening of the first national convention of the National Dialogue at the University of South Africa in Pretoria, where persons with disabilities complained about not being fairly represented and having adequate access to the venue.
Image: Oupa Mokoena / Independent Newspapers
People with disabilities on Saturday complained bitterly about being ignored and not fully represented at the first national convention of the National Dialogue at the University of SA's main campus in Pretoria.
Members of President Cyril Ramaphosa's Presidential Working Group on Disability expressed their unhappiness about the exclusion of representatives of the sector from gathering.
In letter read during the plenary, the working group stated that while it commended the vision behind the dialogue to foster unity, social cohesion and a renewed social compact, it was disheartened that voices from the disability sector appear to have been excluded from the process.
'We, the members of the Presidential Working Group on Disability, write to express our deep concerns regarding the lack of meaningful inclusion of persons with disabilities in the planning and leadership structures of the upcoming National Dialogue and its Eminent Persons Group (EPG),' they noted.
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The working group was established in 2016 and brings together government departments and about 45 civil society organisations from the disability sector.
According to the working group, save for Miss South Africa 2024 Mia le Roux and wheelchair tennis ace Kgothatso Montjane, it must be stressed that individual representation, no matter how commendable, does not amount to meaningful or representative participation of the disability sector.
Montjane and Le Roux are members of the EPG.
The working group added that it recognises the inclusion of Le Roux, a proud deaf woman and the first deaf woman to hold the Miss South Africa title, and honour the achievements of Montjane, a celebrated athlete and disability advocate.
A delegate was even more scathing, stating that the dialogue was a reflection of the space disabled people hold in society.
'I hope that as we move forward with this dialogue and we go to these areas and the villages, that it will be in venues where disabled people can be able to air their voices.
'At the moment, I feel like a stray dog or cat, roaming the road and seen as a nuisance, and even when fed, it is not fed out of care but of just getting the rats out and making sure that there is a tick-a-box exercise,' the wheelchair-bound man complained.
He added that he felt they were in a room that is trapped with ableism and that disabled people cannot even move freely.
'For example, the very platform you said people that will be able to move to that block, disabled people, who are wheelchair users, will not be able to go there,' the delegate stated.
The man continued: 'Which tells you the muted voices, yesterday (Friday) I could not participate here because I was trapped in a hall with stairs and I could not even be allowed to come here because there was nothing to bring us here.'
He said disabled people's voices were not being heard.
'We are present but muted, just so this hall can say disabled people were there to decorate with their chairs but their voices were not there and not present,' the man complained.
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