The government of South Sudan has pledged to provide job opportunities in all government institutions for persone with disabilities.
The plan was unveiled Tuesday during a meeting between the Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare and representatives of Persons with Disabilities (PWDs) in Juba.
Esther Ekere, the undersecretary in the ministry said they are working hard to draft a law for people with disabilities and implement the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
“We now have a 5-year plan which we validated last week, and one of the things is that we are advocating for employment opportunities for persons with disabilities in different areas. I think the Ministry has already taken that into consideration but we want to see other ministries also involved in employing persons with disabilities,” Ekere said.
She stated that, the government will also provide funds and social inclusion programs to women entrepreneurs.
“We are looking into issues of providing social inclusion programs like access to credit and particularly we are targeting women with disabilities because we know from the revitalized agreement, there is a window for women enterprise funds and most of this fund is going to be accessed by women entrepreneurs, but also we know women with disabilities are also entrepreneurs,” she added. “So we want to make sure that women with disabilities who are also entrepreneurs are able to access some of these funds from the government.”
On his part, the Chairperson of the Association of People with Disabilities, Augustino Adu called for unity and equal rights.
“Let’s us unite as persons with disabilities to work collectively to advocate for the rights and equal opportunities for the people with disabilities in South Sudan,” Adu said.
In 2015, the National Legislative Assembly passed the UN Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The convention provides for respect of the rights of people living with disabilities and improvement of their situation.
The Association of People with Disabilities in South Sudan was established in 2016 and was opened officially in 2020 with support from Justice Africa, a non-governmental organization which seeks to promote social justice and human rights in Africa.