File photo
Ms Sophie Boakye Acheampong, President of the Little People Organisation of Ghana (LPOG) has called on Ghanaians especially the elite to train their children to respect differences in human beings.
“People need to learn to appreciate diversity and to respect a person who is different, we are all human beings,” she said.
Ms Boakye Acheampong who is a person of short stature told the Ghana News Agency that she had been stigmatized mostly by educated people those whom she expected to know and respect diversity.
“I avoid going to the shopping malls, on many occasions I have had to scold children of the elite at the malls, they usually mock me or act in a way that is displeasing,” she said.
She said, “In my opinion, the elite, those who are supposed to know better are the ones that stigmatize disability the most.”
On the contrary, Ms Boakye Acheampong said she mostly received help from the average person on the street and most of them are very polite, “I have made a lot of friends in the market so usually when I get to the market, I sit at one place and give my shopping list to my friends to buy the items for me.”
She said access to a lot of public facilities remained her biggest challenge, because of her height “I am unable to use the public toilet, use the ATM independently, I can’t access the counters at the banking hall, in the hospital, it is even difficult to climb unto the doctor’s examination table and during voting, I always have to take my ballot paper from the booth to the table because the platform in the voting booth is taller than me.”
Ms Boakye Acheampong called on the government to put in place measures to enhance the lives of Little Persons and advised people to take concrete steps to accommodate Little Persons within their space.
The Little Persons Organisation of Ghana is a budding one to provide support to people of short stature.
