Home ›› 03 Dec 2021 ›› Opinion
Today’s world population is over seven billion people and more than one billion people, or approximately 15 per cent of the world’s population, live with some form of disability, 80 per cent live in developing countries (WHO). This means persons with disabilities constitute the world’s largest minority community who generally have poorer health, lower education achievements, fewer economic opportunities and higher rates of poverty than people without disabilities. December 3rd is the International Day of Persons with Disabilities and the annual observance of the day was proclaimed in 1992 by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 47/3. The international Day of Persons with Disabilities has greater significance this year because of two important factors, COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the existing socio-economic vulnerability of people with disabilities, and the day reminds us of looking at the progress of the people with disabilities and the commitments made by the Government of Bangladesh in first Global Disability Summit 2018 (GDS18) as the second Global Disability Summit (GDS22) is taking place in Norway in February 2022.
GDS is considered a new era of disability rights movement as this summit offers a concrete mechanism for collecting new, ambitious and wide-spread commitments which are critical to achieving real change for persons with disabilities. The first Global Disability held in 2018 (GDS18) was a historic event for disability inclusion, co-hosted by the UK Department for International Development, the Government of Kenya and the International Disability Alliance. The GDS18 inspired unprecedented engagement and generated commitments to action that will help deliver Agenda 2030’s vision to ‘Leave No One Behind’ as well as existing obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). In the GDS18 Bangladesh government made eight commitments to the international community. Some of those include—formulation of the National Plan of Action on disability to implement the Disability Rights and Protection Act 2013 in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; commitment to eliminate stigma and discrimination about disability from the highest quarter of the state; undertaking a comprehensive disability survey, which will generate a more detailed understanding of disability, and signal a strong commitment to improving data; effective implementation of the disabilities policies and activating committees to ensure inclusion of the persons with disabilities in all aspects of the society; empowerment of the persons with disabilities by providing special quota in the government services; and empowering the organisations of persons with disabilities or OPDs to have a stronger voice in shaping the policies that affect them.
On a positive note, the Bangladesh government has formulated the National Plan of Action on Disability, which is comprehensive and elaborate with the specific roles of the government agencies along with the timelines set for 2018-2025. However, the implementation of the National Action Plan remains in darkness. Though the implementation has been partly affected by the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, many government officers are not still aware of the Persons with Disabilities Rights and Protection Act, 2013 and the responsibilities outlined in the said National Action Plan. For instance, section 3(d) of the National Action Plan mentions about ensuring creation of an environment of freedom of expression and access to information for all people with disabilities in all areas but we have seen that people with disabilities could not avail accessible information during the lockdown and throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. The government also committed in GDS18 to consult and empower OPDs in the development of the policies that are relevant to people with disabilities, but there has been little reflection of this commitment to the ground. There are hundreds of OPDs working in all over Bangladesh, but they have been hardly consulted and communicated by the government for any development planning. It is very important that people with disabilities should talk by themselves instead of someone else is talking for them, which can be put in prominent writer James Charlon’s popular words that ‘nothing about us without us’.
Despite all this, the GDS22 has opened a window of opportunity for Bangladesh to look back at the progresses made and find out the loopholes and the challenges. And the best day to do so can be the International Day of the Persons with Disabilities (IDPD), which is also the National Day of Persons with Disabilities of Bangladesh. Between the last GDS and this one, the COVID-19 pandemic has unleashed a human development crisis that has yet to completely unfold or be understood. What we do know is that the effects of the crisis are unequally distributed, and people who have already been marginalised on the grounds of disability or gender have been disproportionately affected. This makes the need for action all the more urgent, so that the progress made in recent years isn’t undone.
Disability inclusion remains a neglected area of global development. Just 6% of official development assistance is disability inclusive, and although many governments and global organisations have put disability policies and strategies in place, they’re often not properly resourced or put into practice (Sightsavers). We need to get the message across that words are not enough when it comes to inclusive development: actions speak louder. Disability inclusion is an essential condition to upholding human rights, sustainable development, and peace and security. It is also central to the promise of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to leave no one behind. The commitment to realising the rights of persons with disabilities is not only a matter of justice; it is an investment in a common future. The unprecedented impact of Covid-19 has taught us that institutional and exclusive management support needs to be further finetuned in the context of special needs of persons with disabilities. Only disability inclusion will result in an effective COVID-19 response and recovery that better serves everyone, as well as building back better. Because we cannot make progress leaving the ‘world’s minority community’ behind.
The writer works with Sightsavers, an international development organisation
