Communiqué Issued at the Lagos Public presentation of PWDs Charter on Elections

Communiqué Issued at the Lagos Public presentation of PWDs Charter on Elections

Held on Tuesday, September 26^th, 2017 by the International Press Centre (IPC) Lagos under the Strengthening Citizens Engagement in Electoral Process (SCEEP) project, being implemented in Lagos by IPC and supported by ACTIONAID Nigeria and the UKAID through the Department for International Development (DFID).

THE COMMUNIQUÉ

Introduction

Following emerging issues on the need to advance the rights of People With Disabilities (PWDs) to actively participate in elections and positively engage the electoral process, the International Press Centre (IPC) held a one-day forum and public presentation of a draft document of PWDs Charter on Elections in Nigeria. The programme,  which held on Tuesday, September 26^th, 2017 at All Seasons Conference Centre, Agidingbi, Ikeja, Lagos State is part of activities being funded under the Strengthening Citizens Engagement in Electoral Process (SCEEP) project, being implemented in Lagos by IPC and supported by ACTIONAID Nigeria and the UKAID through the Department for International Development (DFID).

The event which was aimed at bringing to public domain, highlights of key issues in the PWDs charter on elections as well as accommodate stakeholders’ contribution on implementation strategies for the southwest zone. It had about 85 participants drawn from the PWDs group entailing the hearing impaired, the visually impaired, the physically challenged, the Albinos as well as representatives of institutional stakeholders including the National Orientation Agency (NOA), the Independent Electoral Commission (INEC), CSO stakeholders, youth, women and the media.

Programme Objective

The objective of the programme was aimed facilitating joint actions of the PWDs community in having a more inclusive participation in elections in Nigeria.

Messages, remarks & presentations

The highlights of the charter were presented by Dr. Dele Seteolu of the Department of Political Science, Lagos State University (LASU) while goodwill remarks werereceived from Mr. Waheed Ishola, Lagos Director of the NOA; Mr. Olufemi Akinbiyi, an assistant Director, Publicity/Protocol from INEC; Representatives of ActionAid Nigeria/BBC media team and members of the PWD Community.

 In his goodwill message, INEC’s representative, Mr. Olufemi Akinbiyi said peoples with disabilities are key to the success of INEC activities given their population of close to 25 million people. He noted that for PWDs to explore their importance and to demand their rights from the politicians, the first and the most significant step to take was to undergo voter registration. He therefore urged people with disabilities to register and vote people they can trust. He added that priority voting for PWDs has been introduced during elections to ensure that PWDs are assisted to easily vote during elections.

Also, in his goodwill message, Mr. Waheed Ishola, Lagos State Director of the NOA expressed his organization’s readiness to support PWDs and other stakeholders to make sure their rights were not infringed upon. In his words, “the National Orientation Agency is your friend and will link you up with other government agencies. Just make sure you put yourselves together with one voice and not be fragmented”. Commenting on the PWDs charter, he said the PWDs charter on elections would ensure that government reckons with and provides good environment that would drive their demands. Mr. Ishola, who also noted that disability was not the end of any person, urged PWDs to get registered so that they could have a say during election, using their strength and numbers. He thereby encouraged them to not just vote for people they can trust, but also aspire for any political position of their choice.

Overview/highlights of the challenges affecting the participation of PWDs in elections in Nigeria:

In his presentation of the overview of challenges affecting PWDs participation in elections, Dr. Dele Seteolu outlined the challenges of PWDs as captured in the charter under five PWDs cluster groups as follows:

·         Women with Disability

-          Women with Disabilities (WWD) have, for long, been experiencing a broad range of roadblocks to the exercise of their right to vote in Nigeria.

-          Most WWD face extreme difficulties that did not necessarily result in obtaining their voters cards such as passing through long queues and going back and forth for several weeks before acquiring voter’s cards, the non-recognition of their disability conditions by INEC officials during the voting process and the frequent breakout of sporadic violence.

-          Circumstantial denials of voting rights to WWD have also featured from one voting cycle to the other. These have mainly manifested at INEC and other voters insistence that WWDs join the queue which physically challenged women could not withstand and failure to provide guides for the blind and deaf.

-          WWD do not belong to political parties because of the physical demands that frequent meetings and traveling for political activities exert on people.

-          Political parties have traditionally marginalized women in Nigeria, which discourages WWD from attempting to participate in them. Therefore, they prefer to confine their roles to voting at election, which has unfortunately remained a source of relative deprivation in Nigeria.

·         People with Physical Challenges

-          Physically challenged persons face discrimination during elections that emanate both from the poor supervision of the electoral process and fellow voters. Central to these were the late arrival of INEC officials to polling stations (PS) amid the glaring absence of required attention to conditions of the physically challenged.

-          In the absence of specially designated areas, many PWDs were stigmatized doing voter registration and during the actual voting at the 2015 elections.

-          The security provided at election venues did not pay attention to PWDs, even when they had verbal exchanges with able bodied voters.

-          Political parties did not fulfill their campaign promises, particularly of presenting some PWDs for elections.

·         People with Albinism

-          Historically, People With Albinism (PWAs) have been dissatisfied with the ways elections have been used to disenfranchise members of their cluster in Nigeria. For example, using the 2015 general elections as benchmark, some of the PWDs in this cluster acknowledged that though it “was fair and peaceful on a general note,” most of them could not exercise their rights to vote immediately on arrival as earlier promised. Without a guide and a place to shade them, as they waited to vote, the only option was to leave to avoid sun burns to their skins resulting from prolonged exposure to the sun.

-          Also, most of them were frustrated that the available materials for voter “information and education” were usually not presented in colours that they could easily comprehend.

·         People with Visual Impairment

-          People with Visual Impairment (VIs) confirmed that some of their voters’ cards were stamped. However, special queues were not formed for this PWD cluster in spite of the fact that they were a people “who could not see.”

-          In addition to that, brailed ballot papers were not available for them to make independent choices of candidates they wished to vote at the elections. Moreover, INEC officials at the Polling Stations (PSs) practically prevented the trusted guides that brought them from assisting them to cast their votes. Instead, the INEC officials “assigned members of the security forces, whom they did not trust, to guide them to cast their votes. In other words, they were denied the secret ballot quality of the voting process and they were not listened to “when they needed INEC officials’ attention”. –Also, despite repeated pleas, “INEC and the political parties did not provide written or other forms of necessary information for People with Visual Impairment (VIs) to have access to voting materials”. For instance, there was “no advertisement … on the available media about political activities for the generality of PWDs.

·         People with Leprosy Cases

-          There was unrestrained “stigmatization” which made it extremely difficult for members of this PWD cluster to form a queue during elections.

-          It was evident that INEC did not expect this cluster to participate in the elections because “no specialist was provided to meet our exceptional needs.” Thus, they were unable to register as voters “since the card readers could not capture fingertips” while neither INEC and the political parties bothered about the situation.

-          In the same vein, they observed that INEC “had never made mention of PWL in an advertisement on print and electronic media.” Also, they and their representatives had never been invited to participate in meetings to ascertain and integrate their special needs into the electoral process.

·         Persons with Hearing Impairment

-          INEC has consistently failed to provide a key means of communication with PWHI during elections in Nigeria. In their own words, “we were not provided any sign language interpreter before or during the last elections.” Similarly, they reported that both INEC and the political parties have never paid any special attention to them during elections in this country. Coupled with that was the consistent late arrival of INEC officials with the ballot boxes to polling units, which caused many of them to leave out of anger and frustration.

Highlight of Demands by PWDs in the Charter on elections

·         Women with Disabilities (WWD) demanded that:

a.            Special voting centres should be established close to them during general elections in Nigeria.

b.            Able bodied voters should be sensitized to stop discriminating against WWDs.

c.            Voters should be well protected and electoral violence totally curtailed.

d.            Political parties should accept, recognize and involve women in all their activities.

e.            Civil society organizations should make deliberate efforts to support WWDs, particularly the graduates among them to gainful employment.

f.             INEC should work with WWDs during elections

·               People with Albinism demanded that:

a.                   INEC should conduct research on how to make polling stations friendlier with a view to providing people with albinism with the best voter experience.

b.                   INEC and the political parties should consult members of this cluster for advice on colours that are appropriate for the design of voting materials and party logos respectively to enhance access to voter information.

·         People with Visual Impairment demanded that:

a.                INEC should ensure that braille ballot papers are provided for this cluster during elections. The braille materials can then be deployed to several other locations within a local government area (LGA) for members of this cluster to vote once for all available offices namely; State Houses of Assembly, House of Representatives, the Senate and the President, etc,.

b.                INEC and political parties should design special voter education for the visually impaired.

People with Leprosy demanded that:

c.                   INEC should provide this cluster with specialized ballot boxes or equipment to capture their votes

Key recommendations for inclusion of all the PWDs clusters into the electoral processes:

i.                 INEC should employ qualified PWDs and saddle them with the tasks of ensuring the participation of this constituency in the political processes and in electoral preparatory process. They could also serve as election observers and be involved in the mobilization of PWDs to participate in elections.

ii.              INEC and the political parties should develop clear and simplified voting guidelines for PWDs: braille for the visually impaired, audios for the blind and television-based sign language for the deaf. PWDs should be engaged to perform these roles.

iii.            INEC should ensure that polling stations are visible and accessible to all PWDs.

iv.             INEC should ensure that the names of all registered PWDs are verified on the voters’ registers and printed in bold for easy identification during elections.

v.               INEC should endeavor to make the voting process easier by sorting out their logistics issues to ensure prompt arrival to the polling stations with voting materials on election days.

vi.             INEC should, before the elections, sensitize its staff that they will encounter PWD and prepare them for the type of voting-related challenges they might have to help them surmount. There are skilled PWDs that INEC could use as facilitators for such sensitization.

vii.          Political Parties should ensure that PWDs are appointed into their administrative structures and offered opportunities to contest and be voted for on their platforms.

viii.        Political parties should include members of all PWD clusters in their campaign teams for elections.

ix.             Workshops should be organized regularly to enlighten the government, political parties and relevant stakeholders on strategies for integrating PWDs into the electoral processes of Nigeria.

x.               INEC should as a matter of urgency ensure the amendment of section 56 of the Electoral Act 2015 to include individuals with other forms of disability.

xi.             INEC should ensure that all categories of PWDs are always contacted for their contributions before changes to the electoral processes are effected before and during elections.

xii.          INEC should convene workshops for a review of the electoral provisions to further respond to the needs of PWDs as the need arises.

xiii.        INEC should provide for the nature of disability on the voter registration cards of PWDs.

xiv.         INEC should ensure that PWDs are not charged any form of fees to register with political parties and be eligible for elections.

xv.           Security agencies should ensure the protection of voters at polling stations, especially for PWDs.

xvi.         Security agencies should not allow themselves to be used to harass and intimidate PWDs.

Conclusion/End Notes:

The PWDs in the programme had syndicate sessions to draw out strategies in advancing the key highlights of the charter. They also expressed gratitude to IPC and its partners; ACTIONAID and UKAID through the Department for International Development (DFID) for supporting the PWDs n developing the charter and in organizing the forum.

Signed:

Lanre Arogundade

Director

International Press Centre (IPC), Lagos, Nigeria

IPC is Nigeria's foremost media capacity development organization.

www.ipcng.org  l  www.twitter.com/IPCng  l www.facebook.com/ipc.nigeria  l  www.youtube.com/ipcng  l  Google+ : Ipc Ng