If you are a person with disabilities in Africa (PWD), then be prepared for a miserable life marked by marginalization, social isolation, inaccessibility of public systems, and scant support. If many able-bodied Africans already face severe disadvantages, then you can only imagine the compounded plight of persons with disabilities and vulnerable groups.
In the dialogues and initiatives surrounding African progress, this topic is notably absent. In my personal experience not ONCE in any African Conference, development forum, or strategic planning session have I heard the topic broached! As if the African future is reserved exclusively for the so-called “able-bodied”.
Today I call on the African people and governments to correct this moral and strategic oversight.
And that is why, in my vision and planning for African nation-building, the rights and needs of PWDs are a central pillar that is integrated into all facets of the national development agenda. It is our sacred duty as builders of the African future, to design the policy, institutional frameworks, and community structures that will safeguard and enhance the lives of the vulnerable among us. Any African initiative that excludes the needs of PWDs is defective and must be revised.
Think broadly: architecture, infrastructure, housing, job training, education, public systems, transportation, marketplaces, assistive devices, social services. Every domain must be touched by this inclusion.
A true African leader is one who, guided from above, surveys the full landscape of the people’s needs—including the most vulnerable—and becomes their fiercest advocate. Not for political points but because it is the right thing to do. Because PWDs are citizens too who deserve equal support, investment, opportunity, and the full dignity of living autonomous, productive lives. They too have inner abilities given by the Creator that call for development!
I call upon the advocates of PWDs across Africa to proudly step forward and speak up. You are needed in African nation-building.
If we are to truly build an African future rooted in furthering values, then let leadership and governance in Africa resemble the Good Samaritan. He did not walk past the man crying out in pain on the roadside. He stopped, tended, and restored him. Such must be the honor Cross of African nation-builders!
As the Great Master was reported to say “…whatever you did to one of the least of my brethren, you did it to Me.” If we are to fulfill this Divine Directive, then we must recognize that PWD’s in Africa are among the “least of these”.
Therefore, only that African leader and government who energetically champions and thoroughly integrates the needs of PWDs and vulnerable groups into every layer of national life, is worthy of gaining Divine approval. Only that leader is a Good Samaritan. That noble leader who, in humility, joyfully helps and uplifts ‘the least of these’, thereby proving themselves to be a real helper to the people and a servant of God of earth!
~Dr. Ikenna A. Ezealah, Ph.D., MBA
Builder of the African Future
Nation Upbuilding 