FG, states urged to provide employment for the educated disabled

Former Deputy National President, Nigeria Association of the Blind, Mr Sunday Adeshina, has called for automatic employment for qualified physically challenged people in the country.

Mr Adeshina, who made the call in Ilorin, advised both the Federal and state governments to gainfully employ disabled people with sufficient skills in the society.

He also stressed the need for the government and the society at large to have positive attitude towards physically challenged people, by providing them with the necessary assistance required.

According to him, the association had sponsored a bill for the establishment of the National Commission for Disabled to facilitate the welfare of the physically challenged in the society, appealing to the National Assembly to hasten work on the passage of the bill.

Mr Adeshina, who is the pioneer principal of the Kwara State School for the Special Needs, also called on the 36 states of the federation to establish a commission to be saddled with such responsibilities.

He frowned at the level of discrimination against disabled people in the society, saying that the ability in disability had enabled many physically challenged to excel in their different fields of specialisations.

Mr Adeshina, who has been blind for the past 50 years, disclosed that his blindness was as a result of chemical poison, but despite the challenges, he had been able to contribute to humanitarian services by rehabilitating people with psychological problems and through his various write-ups.

The pioneer principal of the Kwara State School for Special Needs, also cautioned against putting all categories of handicapped under the same environment.

Mr Adeshina, however, subscribed to the separation of the blind people from the school of the handicapped, saying that the blind and the deaf people could not stay under the same environment.

He noted that it was not ideal to encapsulate all the handicapped people in the same area.

He called on the Kwara State Government to establish a separate school for the blind and the deaf to avoid commotion.

According to him, the present school for the handicapped in the state was specially designed for the deaf and not the blind, hence the need to separate them in the school.

Mr Adeshina also advocated the establishment of an agency to cater for the wellbeing of the disabled in the society and the appointment of Special Adviser on Disabled Affairs that would be manned by the disabled.

He added that the disabled needed people of their own to handle their affairs.

On the premature retirement of a former librarian in the Kwara State School for Special Needs, Mr Femi Omiyale, the pioneer principal of the school appealed to the state government to look into his premature retirement, saying that he became blind while serving government and stressed the need for the release of all his accrued entitlements.