re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability

In the name of kind God and greetings to all of you; once again I am here at your service by providing another discussion supported by the Change in Life Compiegne and the topic of our today’s discussion is about the re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability and the guest that we are having with us are Mr. Muhammad Sadiq Mohebi the activist of the rights for the people with disability and Mr. Ali Mohabati the Coordinator of programs for the people with disability in the Independent Human Rights Commission of Afghanistan.

Question: Dear Mohebi; after the passage of many years of struggles and activities of the institutions working for the disabled community, are you the witness of any change in their life conditions?

Answer: Thanks you and greetings to the fans of the program; regarding the conditions of the people with disability could be considered under discussions from different dimensions.

During the previous years we had some achievement and problems; regarding the achievement I would like to mention that during the past years we could have different laws and rules and regulations regarding the people with disability; i.e. the law of people with disability, service packages of the Ministry of Labor, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disabled (MoLSAMD), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Public Health; from the other side the unionization of Afghanistan with the four international conventions in the area of disability and all these could be good achievements in this area.

Regarding the problems of the people with disability I would like to say that a practical activity is not done for the betterment of the conditions of the people with disability. The people with disability are facing many problems in the area of seeking job, re-empowering, access to the health services, learning services and many other examples.

The reasons that why the people with disability are still facing these problems could be the lack of political support of the government with them, the lack of placement of the disability issue in the priority of the activities in the governmental institutions, lack of specific budget for the people with disability, lack of capacity in the governmental institutions to support the people with disability and many other reasons.

Question: Mr. Mohebi; regarding the laws and service packages which are only on the paper, what are your proposals and recommendations to implement these issues?

Answer: Having the rules are the initial steps to climb on the upper stairs; whenever we don’t have the rules and regulation for the execution of an activity then the institutions are not feeling that they have to do these activities and in this area the fact is that we have a great achievement.

Regarding the implementation of the activities I would like to say that there are some activities but because of the huge number of the people with disability, these activities are not looking remarkable; i.e. in the current situations all the people with disability can have access to the artificial body parts.

Question: Don’t you think that the accomplished activities are only limited to the central provinces of Afghanistan and some other limited cities and the other people with disability in the remote areas are not even aware of their rights?

Answer: Without doubt that one of the problems of the institutions working for the disabled community is that they are mostly focused to the central provinces and some limited cities which is the point of worry for all and we have struggled to expand our activities to other provinces.

Regarding the re-empowering process of the people with disability the activities are done in 16-17 provinces; other institutions are also working in other provinces rather than Kabul but in order to have all over the country then the rules should be implemented and as a result these laws and rules will compel the relevant organizations to work in this regard.

Question: Mr. Mohabati; based on your opinion the lack of consideration about the rights of the people with disability is not the violation of their rights in different areas of the country?

Answer: Thank you very much and greetings to all the fans of the program; for sure that many hopes come after the year 2001 and the presence of the international community in the country causes that different national and international institutions could plan and work for the vulnerable layers of the society but unfortunately we could not properly used and utilized the support of the international community.

Some of the activities which are done as compare to the number of people with disability is very rare and the activities as mentioned before were mostly in the central provinces and some other provinces but the fact is that most of the people with disability are in the remote provinces of the country and most of them are not having access to their rights and without doubt that their rights are violated. The governmental and non-governmental institutions have to work hard for the provision of their rights but currently the problems of security in the country is existing which is negatively effecting the people with disability.

Question: Mr. Mohabati; based on your point of view, do you think that insecurity has caused that less attention is given to the problems of the people with disability and are there other factors?

Answer: Based on my opinion the lack of security is one of the important factors that the services are not provided to the people with disability but there are some other problems and factors like lack of working capacity, negligence of the governmental institutions, more attention of the national and international institutions only to the central provinces of the country and some other cities are the reasons which caused that those disabled people who are living in the remote areas could not access their rights.

Question: Mr. Mohebi; I will appreciate if you give us some information about the re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability?

Answer: The convention number 159 for the people with disability with the name of re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability was conducted on 20th June 1983 in Geneva Switzerland and the member countries were announced there and on 7th April, 2010 the Afghanistan also got the unionization of this convention.

The important issues of this convention were focused on the two sections where the first was the issue of re-empowering of profession and how to make the people with disability professional and the second issue was how to seek job for the people with disability.

In the year 1983 in 69 meetings that the international re-empowering and job seeking organization designed the re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability and the discussions were taken place and over there this issue was discussed that this convention is needed to be created until the governments also participate for such activities and after each two years they update about their activities to the United Nations and fortunately and finally this convention was created in four chapters and 17 articles.

Question: Dear Mohebi; is the government of Afghanistan prepared for the reporting; means that either during the last two years they have some practical activities or not?

Answer: Obviously if we talk about the implementation of the articles of the re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability is not in hand; but there are some laws developed. In consideration of the articles of the law, the civil society and then especially the institutions working for the disabled community are trusting that the article 12th of the labor laws has some problems regarding the category of people with disability; in this article only about the physical disability is mentioned and there is nothing about the other types of the disability.

Question: Mr. Mohabati; Are there statistics with the Independent Human Rights Commission of Afghanistan that how many of the people with disability are jobless and for how many of them the job facilities are provided?

Answer: Obviously, four years back the research and investigation which was conducted by our organization we found that the governmental institutions have very less participated in the hiring of people with disability; but the statistics which was declared by the Ministry of Labor, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disabled (MoLSAMD) as compare to the governmental organizations the non-governmental organizations were able to have three percent of their employees form the people with disability; the non-governmental organizations were a step forward as compare to the governmental organizations they have not accomplished their activities properly.

From the other side it is shown that to those people with disability where the facilities of work is provided were in very lower positions and there were institutions that they announced they are not keen to receive application from the people with disability.

Question: Mr. Mohabati; what the governmental institutions are not accepting the people with disability?

Answer: Well; there are different reasons in this regard; the lack of awareness of the relevant authorities about the rights of the people with disability, negative visions about the ability of the people with disability are the reasons in this regard.

From the other side the authorities are thinking that what they have done for the normal people so that they do for the people with disability which means that the authorities are considering the people with disability in the second layer people of the society and for the time being no change is observed in them that the people with disability can also work and they can continue their lives normally.

Question: Based on your views Mr. Mohabati; isn’t there any problem in the awareness of the governmental institutions, because they are not aware of the capacity and the law that what is considered for the people with disability and as a result improper behavior is observed against them.

Answer: Without dobut that the governmental institutions are not aware about the rights of the people with disability; because whenever the sectorial Ministries are call by the disability commission of the parliament and we are also called as the lawsuit committee and whenever they are asked about the laws regarding the people with disability, it is found that they don’t have information in this regard.

Similarly, the people who are asked from the governmental organizations and the information is shared with them; then these information only remain with them and the other members of that institution is not shared.

The other problem is that lack of attention of the sectorial institutions about the topic of disability; whenever you contact any governmental organization their response would be that they are only the policy makers and they are not the execution bodies and this itself is a big problem creator for the people with disability.

Question: Mr. Mohebi; as it is found from the discussions that there are laws and conventions regarding the people with disability; but unfortunately for the implementation there is no institution to take responsibility, then how and when the problems of the people with disability be solved?

Answer: Yes, in our society we don’t have any problem with the availability of the laws but the biggest problem is the lack of implementation of the law; from the otherside the philosophy of lawsuit is created to properly use the laws and it is still ongoing and this will definitely support the implementations of the laws and conventions.

Based on my point view; the lawsuit should continue until all the problems are solved; the lawsuit should continue regard the allocated budget of the people with disability until it is given to them. Similarly regarding the implementation of the laws, inclusion of the special sectorial institutions regarding the topic of disability and also regarding the statistics of the people with disability the lawsuit should continue.

Question: Mr. Mohebi; the lawsuit is for the purpose that the information is given to the relevant institutions; for example it is said that the Ministry of Higher Education regarding the provision of physical facilities for the people with disability has sent commands to the relevant organizations because if they are building hostels or other places they should consider the issue of disability but such an action is not seen practically; then where is the problem that the authorities are violating the laws and commands?

Answer: I think that some issues are effective in this regard; first the lack of awareness among the government authorities, second careless on the re-empowering of the people with disability, third is the lack of proper monitoring of the relevant institutions, not pursuit of the violators of the law and the other issue is that all of them hold that hands of each other and this problem remains unsolved. But the Lawsuit Committee for the people with disability has always struggled and will continue its efforts in future.

Question: Mr. Mohebi; do you have any information about any governmental institution which has obeyed the articles of the re-empowering of profession and job seeking convention for the people with disability and based on the law do they have three percent of their employees from the people with disability?

Answer: Regarding this issue that the institutions has implemented all the articles of the convention, such an example is not available; but regarding the physical access the Ministry of Haj (Pilgrimage) has considered and in overall building of this Ministry you can observe easy access for the people with disability. Regarding job seeking; the report disseminated by Independent Election Commission was showing that this commission used five percent of its temporary employees from the people with disability. Similarly the Ministry of Labor, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disabled (MoLSAMD) has also implemented this and the best is seen in the non-governmental institutions working for the people with disability and based on the studies it is found that they could have more than fifty percent of their employees from the people with disability but the other institutions are not like this.

Question: Mr. Mohabati; how can we solve this legal problem and how would we be able to stop violation of the rights of the people with disability?

Answer: Obviously there are some ways based on my point of views that we would be able to solve the problems; we as the civil society and then especially the institutions working for the disabled community should properly monitor the activities which are concerned for the people with disability and for the accomplishment of the activities we should have proper lawsuits. Similarly with the close collaboration and coordination of the civil society and governmental institutions this problem could be solved to some extent; from the other side the parliament should increase its monitoring because one of the important activities of the parliament is the monitoring of the implementation of the law process and therefore they should have a continues monitoring in this regard; also the media can play a good role in the provision of information and awareness to the governmental authorities and people of the society.

Many thanks from the fans of the program that you followed our discussions until end.