ActionAid Ghana donates to Wa School for the Blind

Wa, June 18, GNA – ActionAid Ghana, a non-governmental organisation has provided assorted items to the Wa School for the Blind to help alleviate the suffering of students who lost their belongings in two separate fire outbreak.

The two disasters occurred in the school last year.

The items that was valued at GH¢ 7,600 included 50 student mattresses, 10 bags of rice, five gallons of edible oil, five cartons of tomato paste tomato, 30 bundles of roofing sheets, 100 pieces of white canes, 50 Braille sheets and papers, 10 writing frames styles, eight binders and one comb binding machine.

Madam Esther Boateng, Programme Manager of ActionAid Ghana who presented the items at a ceremony to mark this year's Day of the African Child in Wa, was on the theme: “The rights of children with disabilities: The duty to protect, respect, promote and fulfil.”

She said children with visual impairments were generally confined in most communities and therefore their plight was often ignored, disregarded.

The consequences of these, she said led to endemic violation of their rights such as the right to education, health and protection from abuse and neglect.

Madam Boateng noted that children with disabilities face multiple forms of vulnerability and their plight should not continue.

The ActionAid Programme Manager explained that statistics had shown that at least 25 per cent of any population was adversely affected by the presence of disability.

Half a million of them became blind every year, 60 per cent die in childhood and leaving a total of about 1.5 million of whom four-fifths lived in the developing world.

Madam Boateng called for urgent action for children with disabilities, on the part of policy makers and service providers while government should put up measures to stop the different forms of violations of rights of those with disabilities.

That, she said required strong political will and commitment from government and civil society in order to facilitate coherent understanding of the legal and policy framework for children with disabilities in Ghana as well as the current human rights and disability thinking and practice methodologies.

“The need for a unified understanding and working together in the area of children with disabilities cannot be over emphasised because effective promotion of the rights of children with disabilities cannot be achieved in a piecemeal fashion,” Madam Boateng noted.

Alhaji Duogu Yakubu, Municipal Chief Executive who graced the occasion called on child rights activists not to relent in their efforts to advocate and promote the rights and welfare of children who are vulnerable in the society.

He said government would continue to demonstrate commitment to respect international protocols especially those relating to child rights, protection and promotion and would appreciate any collaborative support from development partners.

Mr Sampson Akurigu, Headmaster of the School, appealed to ActionAid Ghana and other non-governmental organisations as well as corporate institutions and organisations to adopt the school to help the children to acquire the necessary education to become self-reliant.

He appealed to the government to release the school's feeding grants and increase the amount without delay since suppliers of foods items to the academic facility are embarrassing the authorities.

ActionAid feted 199 children, comprising 120 boys and 79 girls as part of activities marking the day.

GNA