MDAs asked to redesign buildings

Alhaji Abubakar Saddique Boniface, Minister of Water Resource, Works and Housing, said on Tuesday that with the passage of the Disability Law, Act 715, it was important that all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) re-designed their buildings to make room for the installation of elevators.

He said MDAs that did not have the capacity to do so would have to make alternative arrangement for their Ministers to have their offices on the ground floor so that Persons With Disabilities (PWD) would be able to reach them easily.

Answering a question during his turn at the weekly Meet-The-Press series in Accra, he said it was important that institutions came to terms with the Disability Law, Act 715.

The Act is aimed at ensuring that PWDs enjoy the rights enshrined in Article 29 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, with a vision to improving their quality of life and mainstreaming PWDs activities.

The transitional period of the Act makes provision for a 10-year moratorium for compliance with the provisions on access and mobility because of the substantial investment needed to make all existing public infrastructure disability-friendly.

Alhaji Boniface said as the former Minister for Manpower, Youth and Employment, who pushed for the passage of the Bill, it was disheartening to note that the sector Ministry did not have any access routes for PWDs.

"Before I left office I asked that an elevator be installed so that the PWDs could have easy access to the Minister and this is what is expected of every other Ministry, Department and Agency," he said.