The draft has been condemned for not guaranteeing rights of people with disabilities as most of the provisions are based on availability of resources.
Disability Activists submitted their concerns through the Clerk of Parliament for them to be discussed by President Robert Mugabe, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara at the principals’ Monday meetings.
They are calling for the redrafting of sections 22 and 83 since the spirit of the draft “is very unfriendly to people with disabilities.”
“As people with disabilities we feel phrases such as ‘resources permitting and government to recognise’ reflect lack of government commitment to take issues concerning people with disabilities with the seriousness they deserve.
“Our understanding of the phrase ‘within the limits of available resources’ is that people with disabilities have no un-negotiable rights and that government has no binding obligation to address concerns of the disabled. For us the word ‘recognize’ sounds too watered down to help further interests of members of our constituency,” said Matete.
He said surprisingly such words were replaced with ‘must’ for provisions in the draft that have to do with the war veterans and women. “The draft degrades people with disabilities to charity case. One would realise that section 22 was simply cut from the Kariba Draft and pasted to the so called final draft constitution.”
Matete said government and people think disability is expensive so they do not want to give it much attention.
During the outreach programme people indicated that they wanted people with disabilities to have representation at all levels of decision making in government but the final draft only has provision for two senators.
This left people with disabilities suspecting that some data could have got lost between the outreach and compilation stages.
If the draft is not amended as suggested people with disabilities fear their situation would be thrown back to the Rhodesia and Nyasaland era ‘where they were regarded as people only capable of mending shoes under the tree for a living’.
They feel the sections could be amended without causing harm to the whole document. Regardless, people with disabilities are for the Yes Vote.
All what people with disabilities are against is to be regarded as a welfare case. They want to be involved in formulation of policies to concerning them, have right to equal opportunities, have right to an independent life and be granted a quota share in all aspects of life among others.
They wondered why some of the 60 seats reserved for women were not specifically allocated women with disabilities.
Matete described disability as a national condition which deserves a fair address through the constitution since everyone has the potential to be disabled.
Post published in: News