LOVE LETTERS TO TANZANIA : Wondering what discrimination feels like?

Ask people with disabilities. They are still among the most discriminated against in the world: facing persistent prejudice, they are vastly underrepresented in lucrative occupations and rarely reach positions of influence – regardless of their capabilities.

Persons with disabilities continue to face barriers to education and even essential services like health care. In addition to neglect and blatant discrimination, even physical violence is not uncommon. According to Human Rights Watch, if displaced during war, people with disabilities are often neglected in the humanitarian responses and suffer disproportionately.

Entrenched prejudices persist, even among educated leaders and despite the United Nations Convention of the Right of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), signed and ratified by Tanzania. The fact that citizens with disabilities also have many abilities is often overlooked. The degree to which they can cope in their daily lives and contribute to society not only depends on their abilities, but also on society.

As a child, I rarely met a person with a disability, and the typical European double- or triple-storey school buildings had no wheelchair access. Such exclusion meant that people with disabilities were invisible until society began to accept that equal access to all community facilities and services is a basic human right.

Once, a door-to-door salesman tried to sell my mother greeting cards for “a good cause”. We had no money for non-essentials, but noted that the superb cards were “mouth and foot painted”. The children turned the concept into a challenge. Most could not hold a pencil with their toes, but my sister had talent. Although no Michelangelo, she managed to write with her foot. Sadly, what was child’s play to us, was a harsh reality for people living with serious disabilities in the 1970s. Society viewed persons with disabilities as objects of charity, in need of medical rectification or institutionalisation.

At the time, thousands of people had learned to live with the serious birth defects caused by a drug called Contergan or Thalidomite, not sufficiently tested before being prescribed to pregnant women, but too many were simply locked up in institutions. Eventually, when the local post office was finally equipped with a wheelchair ramp, it seemed symbolic of slowly changing attitudes.

Are we more enlightened today? Legislators in many countries are working towards ensuring persons with disabilities enjoy full equality under the law, but seem in no hurry to truly enforce disability rights. Do lawmakers and citizens truly accept people with disabilities as competent, equal members of society, who – with some assistance - could thrive in many endeavours?

As economic growth lifts more global citizens out of poverty every day, people with disabilities are left behind, struggling to achieve the most basic standard of living. Many live desperate lives of poverty and social isolation, even where communities prosper. Disabilities are still used to justify human rights abuses and to exclude persons with a disability from basic services. They and their families often feel abandoned by governments and their communities.

It is up to society - in fact, it is our moral obligation as human beings to remove barriers to the participation of persons with a disability in society. As an educator, I am particularly concerned about disabled children being excluded from free primary and secondary education.

We have a collective responsibility to remove barriers to education for such children and young adults. Schools and universities need to play an active role in promoting their inclusion and participation in society. They must educate citizens about human rights principles and challenge negative beliefs and attitudes which result in bullying and acts of violence.

Ratification of the CRPD needs to be reflected in authorities’ policies, and in practices which truly demonstrate “respect for the evolving capacities of children with disabilities” and provide the “equality of opportunity” promised. Ask yourself: where would Professor Stephen Hawking be without education?