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From Okwe Obi Abuja
The Resource Centre for Human Rights and Civic Education (CHRICED), has lamented the poor living condition of original inhabitants of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja, stating that most of them are going through socio-economic hardship.
CHRICED’s Programme Officer, Armsfree Ajanaku, who made the submission when he visited FCT School of the Blinds recently in Kwali Area Council, charged the FCT Administration to meet their needs.
Regardless, Ajanaku disclosed that CHRICED recently initiated a project targeted at salvaging their plights.
“This project is titled Promoting the Rights of Original Inhabitants of Federal Capital Territory.
“It is a project factors the needs and rights of the vulnerable people and as you can see, we have the original inhabitants, persons with disability group.
“What necessitated the tour to see for ourselves and also interact with them was because if you are not going through the situation, if you are not in the shoes of persons passing through the challenge you may not really understand what they are facing. So that is why the organisation said let us hear directly from the people that are affected and how has the system treated them.
“So our project is all about mainstreaming the voices of marginalized population in the governance process. And you could hear them talk about some of the things they need like training, job opportunities. They want the government and agencies to be more responsive to their needs.
“It is a shame that government agencies can organise training for jobs and skills acquisition and not factor in the people who need it the most and these people because of their disability are not able to access opportunities and they feel neglected.
“You could see some of them close to tears describing the kind of experiences of how the rest of population treats them with indignity.
“So this is what we try to portray: we are not just looking at it from the point of problems, but we are looking at it in terms of way forward, solutions.
“This will now be a basis for us to reach our respective agencies concerned to factor the needs of these special people more in the governance processes,” he said.
