Vice President against discrimination against PWDs

Accra, June 11, GNA-Vice-President John Dramani Mahama on Monday cautioned public and private institutions against discriminating against persons with disability (PWDs) in the engagement of workers.

He said such discrimination was not only illegal, but immoral in the perspective of fundamental human rights.

“When persons with disability go for job interviews, they can have better curriculum vitae but as soon as the employers realise that they are disabled they are discriminated against,” he said.

Vice President Mahama made the call when he launched the start of an Information and Communications Technology (ICT) training programme initiated by the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare and Rlg Communications, a local telecommunication company for PWDs in Accra.

He also inaugurated an ICT training centre for the programme at the Accra Rehabilitation Centre.

Under the GH¢21 million programme, 5,000 PWDs nationwide will be trained in ICT, mobile phone and computer repairs for six months.

The government is contributing GH¢19 million, while Rlg is supporting with GH¢2million to cater for the tuition fees and transportation allowances for the trainees.

After the training, the graduates will be engaged as instructors in the various resource centres, mobile phone and computer repairers in the districts, while others will be assisted to set up shops to sell and market Rlg products.

Vice President said PWDs were not created to be beggars on the streets, basket weavers, or shoe makers and that they could do the same work as the able persons and even do it better, since “disability is not inability”.

On the training, the Vice President said “The world is changing and becoming modern”, hence the need to equip the PWDs with ICT skills to fit into the job market.

The Vice President said the government intended to train about 20,000 PWDs countrywide by the end of 2013.

Mr Enoch Teye Mensah, Minister of Employment and Social Welfare said the ICT training for PWDs was in line with the government's key pillar of investing in people, since that was the only way the people could realise their potentials.

He said the PWDs were to receive ICT training that would make them marketable on the job market and afford them the opportunity of having a decent life.

Mr Roland Agambire, Chief Executive Officer of rlG said the training of the PWDs fell in line with his determination to revolutionise ICT in Africa and create one million jobs for the youth in the world.

He stressed that it was the desire of the rlG to give decent jobs to at least 30 per cent of the four million PWDs in the country, and indicated that the graduates would become technicians, engineers and sale's persons.

Mr Agambire announced that rlG would soon cut the sod for the start of construction works of a Technology City that is modeled in the form of the Silicon Valley in California, USA to enable the company to realise its dream of creating one million jobs.

The Board Chairman of the National Council for Persons with Disability, Mr Andrew Okaikoi, stressed that the ICT training would “enhance the job opportunities for the persons with disability in today's technology-driven world.

GNA