AL JAMA-AH Party notes the efforts done by the National Department of Social Development during the month of November in which it focussed on the rights of people with disabilities and government’s quest for their inclusion in services provided.
The Department of Social Development chose the Western Cape to be the first province to receive feedback on the report on public hearings on the Draft Policy on Social Development Services to Persons with Disabilities. In Commemoration of the Disability Rights Month, this report was handed over by the Deputy Minister of Social Development, Al Jama-ah’s President Ganief Hendricks, to the MEC Jaco Londt on 4 November 2024.
In line with AL JAMA-AH’s Manifesto Promise, we call on government to ensure:
- Increase Sheltered Factories and workplaces to accommodate wheelchairs and with enough tenders to ensure a 24-hour operation of employment .
- That the 1000 products stated in the President’s Localization Programme should exclusively be made by these factories.
- We further call on President Ramaphosa, the Deputy President and Minister for Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities to stop paying lip services to the grievances of people with disabilities; but to take action to ensure increased institutions for education, skills development, medical care and full employment for them.
- All citizens with disabilities must receive employment benefits such as provident and retirement funds and not be reliant on social grants.
- There should be no discrimination against people with disabilities.
The Premier of the Western Cape has not kept his promise to measure the sizes of wheelchairs needed. It is a shame that there are many who still need wheelchairs as the province failed to spend the budget meant to improve the lives of people with disabilities.
For the past three years people with HIV/Aids too were denied services because the province used the budget on other projects. The reprimanding letters from Treasury to the Province, is useless, they must ‘crack the whip’ on them.
All provinces and municipalities must ‘up their game’ to provide better services to people with disabilities and to meet their BEE targets on employment.
The Department of Labour has over the years dismally failed people with disabilities by not holding businesses accountable for not employing them; another culprit is the Department of Small Business Development who has let the country down!
The Deputy Minister of Social Development is not in the House today, as he is currently in Durban where he is securing a R200 000 grant for business opportunities for people with disabilities; this grant will help to fit out and stock up spaza shops for them and establish smart farms which would include aspirant farmers with disabilities especially in rural areas.
Why is it that the other relevant departments lacks the will to ensure that those with disabilities are catered for and empowered!
Thank You”
Adv Shameemah Salie, MP