Disabled children not attending school due to inability of parents to pay fees

Some disabled children at Senchi in the Asuogyaman District are not attending school because their parents cannot not afford to pay their fees at the Mampong School for the Deaf.

Mr. David Amevo, the father of three deaf and dumb children, told the GNA in an interview during the Eastern Regional celebration of the National Children’s Day at Senchi that three of his seven children were born with the disability and he could not afford to pay their fees at the School for the Deaf.

He said he initially sent two of them to the School but found it difficult to pay their fees.

Mr. Amevo said school had reopened but the children are at home because they were given notice to pay their fees before coming to school and that he was finding it difficult to pay 250 Ghana cedis for the two children.

Mr. Amevo said it was difficult taking care of all seven children including the three with disabilities and he was tempted to leave them and concentrate on the four able children.

The plight of other children with disability who are not going to school because of their parents’ inability to take care of them at the special schools also came up during an open forum.

The National Children’s Day is celebrated every August in Ghana to raise the awareness of the need to educate and protect children’s rights and this year’s theme was “rights of the disabled child, the role of the community”.

Mr. Anthony Dontoh, the Eastern Regional Director of the Department of Children of the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs, said children with disability had the right to go to school hence the provision of special schools to take care of their education and training.

He said the disabled child had equal rights with all other children and urged parents not to discriminate against their children with disabilities and also advised the community to support parents with such children to reduce stigma and discrimination.

The District Chief Executive, Mr. Johnson Ahiakpor, said the Assembly had a facility to take care of the disabled and the assembly had so far spent GHC 24,000 on people with disabilities including the sponsorship of two children to the Akropong School for the Blind.

He appealed to parents who have such children and finding it difficult to educate them to register with the Social Welfare Department to enable them received support from the assembly’s disabled fund.

A seven-member Community Volunteer Child Protection Team was later inaugurated to campaign against child rights issues such as teenage pregnancies, child labour and trafficking.