Movement of Disabled Peoples Organizations (Self Help Organizations) facilitate by YPSA

Introduction :

YPSA is working in Sitakund Upazilla under Chittagong District which is located in south east costal part of Bangladesh to ensure a barrier free & Right based society for Persons with Disabilities since 2001. Since then, the YPSA has focused on establishing and supporting Disabled Peoples organizations for persons with disabilities living in the Sitakund area. In this moment, there are 33 Disabled Peoples Organizations, established with the active guidance of YPSA. And that includes 4 organizations of women with disabilities, 1 organization of beggars who are also visually challenged and another organization is composed by sign language users.

From these 33 organizations, a committee of 25 leaders is elected in an annual Convention by the vote of all participant members which is called Sitakund Upazilla Coordination Committee (Federation) of Self-Help Organizations.

Prior situation

Previously, many of the Persons with Disabilities lived very isolated lives, totally dependent on their families for financial and physical support. The social model of disability recognizes that "disability" often arises not from the actual medical condition that a person has, but from external factors such as the physical environment and attitudes of the people around them.

Impact of YPSA for the self help organization

Previously, if somebody wanted help in approaching government officers, he or she would ask an YPSA staff member to do this on his or her behalf. Because everyone was separate and work was happening at an individual level only, this process was not resulting in any long-term change or empowering persons with disabilities to be able to do these by themselves. YPSA is taking initiatives so that they can form their own self help organization to be involved by themselves and voice out about their rights

There are government departments offering different types of training in income-generating activities (e.g. Women's Welfare Department offers training for women) and previously these were not offered to persons with disabilities. Initially, YPSA organized some training in income-generating activities since persons with disabilities could not access these. This proved that persons with disabilities could benefit from this training and through continues advocacy, YPSA succeeded in getting those running the training programs to accept people with disabilities as participants. YPSA no longer runs this training, as it is possible for persons with disabilities to access government-run training.

With the support of YPSA, some of the self-help organization leaders are representatives on different government committees (e.g. Education Allowances Sub-Committee of the Upazilla Social Welfare Department). In the future, there will be persons with disabilities as representatives on all the government sub-committees and local government steering committees. At present, leaders of the self-help organizations are preparing to run as candidates in the next local government elections, motivated by Leadership training given by YPSA. Persons with disabilities identified that if they are unable to participate in the power structure, it is difficult for them to achieve their rights.

YPSA practices a process of Participatory Planning and Budget (PPB), where persons with disabilities are consulted to give their opinion on how the program and budget should be utilized. This is an extremely valuable process, as it directly enables YPSA to see what their program partner's view as priority areas - not what YPSA perceives to be the priority areas on their behalf. Hence, the persons with disabilities have a strong voice in those activities in which they will be involved.

Leaders of the self-help organizations have joined together to form an Upazilla Coordination Committee (Federation) of Self-Help Organizations. This was initiated by YPSA but is now self-sufficient and running well. By joining the leaders together, this has created a stronger voice for persons with disabilities in cases of inhumane and unjust treatment. For example, last year a young girl who is a sign language user was gang raped. The Self-Help Organization Federation acted on behalf of the girl in approaching the local police station to demand that this incident be investigated. In addition, through their advocacy, this story was published in the local news.

Impact of the self help organization

Through the formation of these self-help organizations and provision of practical training, now there are several strong leaders from within the groups (i.e. persons with disabilities) who are assisting others in these tasks. In the last two years, there has been an increase in the number of persons with disabilities who receive the government disability support payments.

Some of the women with disabilities have received training in income-generating activities (e.g. handicrafts and tailoring), so that they have the means to earn their own money. This reduces their dependence on their family for financial support, and shows the community around them that they are capable of doing useful and meaningful work. In turn, this has improved the general attitude towards persons with disabilities, who are less likely to be seen as a burden but as people with skills who can contribute to society around them.

Gathering these individuals together and providing training on their rights, as well as practical training in accessing government support services, has brought about an improvement in the lives of many of these people. Through the formation of self-help organizations, persons with disabilities in the Sitakund area are less isolated than they were previously. As well as providing much-needed emotional support, through participation in self-help organizations many of these persons with disabilities are better informed of their rights and how to demand that these are met. Now they can learn and take support from each other in demanding their rights from government officials, employers, educational institutions and others.

Another activity of the Upazilla Federation of Self-Help Organizations was to arrange a meeting with the District Bus Owner & Labor Union to discuss a strategy to make bus travel more accessible to persons with disabilities. In addition to the physical barriers to access the buses, the staff members working on these buses were not willing to take passengers with disabilities. Through increasing their awareness and providing practical strategies for assisting persons with disabilities traveling by bus, this has resulted in more people being able to access public transport.

With support and encouragement from YPSA, other men who are visually challenged have taken out loans from government or from YPSA's micro-credit program to establish their own small businesses. This is again showing to people in the community that disability does not need to be a barrier to self-employment or being an active member of the local community.

Conclusion and way forward

YPSA is aware of the need to avoid dependence on their input and is acting to introduce and assist persons with disabilities to access services that already exist, provided by the government. Through the above-mentioned activities, the lives of persons with disabilities have greatly improved and they are not so isolated and helpless. Natural leaders have emerged and are being supported to work together for the advancement of rights of persons with disabilities throughout the Sitakund area. In future, YPSA will organize different training for developing leadership following UNCRPD and make the leaders more skillful so that they can fight for their own rights, independently. YPSA has plan to mobilize 50 Disabled Peoples Organizations in Sitakund and want to scale up this movement in the greater Chittagong Division through own organizational setup and network members of Chittagong Society for the Disabled CSD . YPSA will take initiatives to facilitate the whole process based on our experiences and skills. In future, all the self help organizations will be the independent and sustainable organizations and will develop strong network.