The Ghana Federation of the Disabled (GFD) has asked government to review the Persons With Disability (PWD) Act, to conform to the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons With Disabilities (UNCRPD).
The GFD says Ghana’s ratification of the UNCRPD was an indication that government consented to review its domestic laws on disabilities.
Mrs Rita Kyeremaa Kusi, Executive Director of the federation who made the request in an interview with Ghana News Agency in Accra said there are some deficiencies in a draft report on the review of the Persons with Disability Act, 2006 (Act 715).
She said the draft report has revealed that the Act suffers some poor drafting errors that ought to be corrected.
The goal of the UNCPRD is expected to significantly redress the profound social disadvantage of PWDs and promote their participation in the civil, political, economic, social and cultural spheres with equal opportunities.
In view of this the GFD contracted Law and Development Associate to carry out a Draft Gap Analysis Report on the PWDs Act 2006 (Act 715) dated April 2013.
The report said the Act lacks disability rights to protection in the Convention such as the rights of “women with disabilities,” the rights of “children with disabilities,” and the inherent “right to life”.
The PWDs Act is also deficient in the “protection against inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”, “protecting the integrity of the person”, right to “liberty of movement and nationality” and “freedom of expression and opinion”, and “access to information”.
It said the PWDs Act failed to capture “respect for privacy” and “participation in political and public life”.
The report said even though most of the UNCRPD rights were not captured in the PWD Act, they were already guaranteed under the 1992 Constitution.
Mrs Kusi said government needs to rectify the anomalies before presenting its reports on the ratification in 2014 and before parliament passes the legislative instrument on it.
She said the current situation is not good for the image of Ghana.
