Over 25m Nigerians are Disabled

There over 25 million Nigerians who suffer from one physical deformity or the other, with over 3.5million of them having difficult challenges of moving around.

This was disclosed by the National Coordinator of the Association of Indigenous People with Disabilities (AIPD), Dr. Joseph Ify Chikunie, who lamented that another problem was that government had no programme or special provision for them.

Chikunie, a lecturer at the University of Lagos and himself physically challenged, cried out that people with disability needed the protection of government to promote equal opportunities for all people.

He insisted that the physically changed who make up over 30 per cent of the nation's population must be engaged and trained for worthy causes instead of being encouraged to be beggars on the streets of the nation.

He agreed that “the greatest challenge is impediment in mobility; such people could be trained for worthy causes that will suit their kind of deformity.”

Chikunie who battled deformity to train himself up to PhD level at the University of Lagos where he now teaches Philosophy wondered why government and corporate bodies did not factor in the fact that not everybody was able bodied when designing their programmes and projects.

“For instance, I watched emotionally a young woman, who has money in the bank but could not withdraw from the ATM machine. This woman actually sits on a wheelchair and if you see the way the ATM is designed, it is a bit high for someone who is on a wheel chair. So, she tried to withdraw her money with her card but fell over as she was stretching; she kept trying but she did not succeed. Now, if that hole has been lowered, she would have been able to withdraw her money effortlessly.

“This is just an instance. You see very high buildings with no elevators. For instance, I was in the University of Lagos for four years and that time, the elevator at the Faculty of Arts was not functioning and I remember I had to walk the four floors because most of our classes held in the fourth floor. So, I walk up the staircase almost every day.