RUYIGI, October 29th (ABP) – The population of Ruyigi, and especially people living with disabilities are called upon to join forces for the protection and preservation of the environment, which is one of the pillars of sustainable development. This appeal is made by Caritas Kamariza, deputy leader of the Union of People with Disabilities in Burundi (UPHB). This is at a time when a delegation from that organization has just completed a two-day awareness-raising tour for the change of behavior of the population regarding the perception of people with disabilities in that province. This tour made by the members of the UPHB took them to the Nyabitsinda district’s headquarters and to the Muhwazi County, and to the Butaganzwa district’s headquarters. In all those localities, the deputy leader of the UPHB insisted a lot on the fact that people with disabilities must have a valuable consideration because they are able to contribute to development and especially to the environmental preservation. She thus asks the administration and the community in their diversity, to always involve people with disabilities in their respective localities in the protection of the environment and to give them the opportunity to express themselves to the challenges of the community without denigrating them.
She also called on people with disabilities themselves to come out of the shadows, to assert themselves and assert their rights and duties of citizenship by joining the member associations of that union that exist in the province.
The representatives of people with disabilities as well as some community leaders in the two districts positively appreciated that awareness-raising opportunity. Indeed, they emphasize, disabled people can demonstrate abilities and faculty as much as non-disabled people. They indicate that there are already traders, civil servants, tailors, bank agents who work better than so-called able-bodied people.
To all individuals who perceive disabled people as incapable ones, monsters or people with bad luck, they invited them to stop all those false ideas.