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LEAP is not charity but investment - Deputy Minister
Accra, March 10, Ghanadot/GNA - The Deputy Minister of
Manpower Development, Youth and Employment, Madam Frema
Osei-Opare, on Monday said the introduction of the
Livelihood Empowerment against Poverty (LEAP) was not
charity but an investment for future development.
She said all other government interventions like the
microfinance scheme to support persons with disabilities,
cash incentives for persons with disabilities in the public
sector as well as percentage of district assemblies fund to
support initiatives of persons with disabilities fell under
the National Social Protection Strategy and must all be seen
as investment and not charity.
Speaking at the celebration of International Women’s Day by
the Women’s Wing of the Ghana Association of the Blind (GAB)
in Accra, Madam Osei-Opare said government would from this
year, under the LEAP scheme, provide direct cash transfer to
households with severe disabilities to support them and
restore their dignity in the society.
She said the consequences of persons with disability,
especially women, were serious due to their subjection to
social, cultural and economic disadvantages which impeded
their access to health care, education, vocational training
and employment.
According to her, realizing the difficulties faced by
persons with disability, government passed the Disability
Act which seeks to recognize and mainstream the needs of
persons with disability in the country’s national
development process.
In her message, the National Advocacy Awareness Raising and
Lobbying Committee Chairperson of the Women’s Wing of GAB,
Miss Alimata Karimu said the rights of women and girls with
visual impairment had been overlooked over the years.
She said they had been discriminated against by the society
in general, not only because of the disability but because
they were females and mostly among the poor.
Miss Karimu said the inadequate or total lack of access to
information, health care and rehabilitation services further
compounded by higher illiteracy rates forced them into being
the most isolated and marginalized in the society.
She called for the inclusion of visually impaired women in
mainstream policies and programmes, income generation
activities and micro credit systems to address the
challenges facing them.
GNA
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