DISABILITY CONCERNS

        A Senior Lecturer at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Dr. Anthony Adusei says the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability places a huge challenge on Ghana to adopt more social, community based and inclusive approaches to interventions that concern persons with disability and their families. It is on this score that the Inclusive Education Policy developed by the Special Education Division of the Ghana Education Service is receiving urgent attention of Government. Dr. Adusei said this at, a persons with disability advocacy programme at Manso Nkwanta in the Amansie West District of Ashanti. He noted that the Disability Act is currently being reviewed to be in tune with the tenets of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability. The final outcome of the review of the Act would provide a legal framework for promoting inclusive policies and programmes across the country. Dr. Adusei said the guidelines for the disbursement of the District Assemblies’ Common Fund ought to be vigorously pursued to ensure that issues of children and youth with disabilities and their parents are adequately captured. According to him, recent World Health Organization world disability report put the rate of disability in developing countries at 15 per cent, taking into account of both visible and invisible disabilities. However, the summary report of the final results of Ghana’s 2010 Population and Housing census shows that there are about 737 thousand persons with some form of disability, representing three per cent of the total population. Dr. Adusei noted that the difference between the WHO figures and that of the 2010 Population and Housing Census is worth investigating to help Ghanaians understand what constituted the difference. He said the impression gathered is that there was under representation of what constitutes disability in Ghana as against what was reported in the World Disability Report adding that the investigation would be most relevant for effective national planning.