27 May 2006
WE ignore them. Or worse, we target their singularity
with derisive jokes, responding to one of humanity's most
primitive urges, the survival instinct that rejects
differences.
The cruelly twisted bodies of the crippled, the blank
eyes that spell blindness in the toddler, the perfectly
shaped ears that will never hear a mother's voice - these
and countless other disabilities are the lot of many
Papua New Guineans.
Few have experienced sympathy or a helping hand.
Fewer still want charity, or the acknowledgement that
labels them as oddities in a normal world.
The disabled of PNG seek recognition, not as an
unfortunate adjunct to our society, but as an integral
and contributory strand in this nation's diverse
fabric.
For many years, our countrymen and women with
disabilities have suffered in villages, the focus of
crude humour, humans that are seen as inhuman, as
aberrant monsters.
Often their plight is attributed to witchcraft. Their
condition is the result of sorcery, of the wicked actions
of an unknown village enemy.
That does not help them; frequently they are not
regarded as innocent victims of another's malevolence,
but evil manifestations of the same dark powers.
In towns and cities, our mean streets have become
littered with the crippled, with amputees, with those
whose limbs are shrivelled, and with the elderly who have
never been able to walk, or to see, or to hear.
Propped up at the sides of urban pavements, they try
to hide their distress and beg for their very existence.
Often they are there because heartless relatives use them
to scrounge coins from embarrassed passers-by.
Their disabilities become a distressing sideshow for
the fit and the healthy; the more unusual their
disability, the more relatives will expect to reap from
the public display of their anguish.
It is only in relatively recent times that concerned
members of the community have sought to alleviate this
shameful situation. These people are a tiny hard-working
minority of volunteers.
They help those with disabilities, and that help
increasingly takes the form of training, of encouragement
to maximise the many skills dormant among the
disabled.
If there is one distinctive feature shared by disabled
Papua New Guineans, it is the refusal to accept
charity.
These people roundly reject conscience-salving
gestures from those who can easily afford them.
Nienke van der Zwan-
Spruijt is a Dutch volunteer. She has fought to
establish a communication link that will serve the
disabled thousands of our country. Some of us Papua New
Guineans may feel a fleeting sense of shame that it takes
a foreign volunteer to establish a national news magazine
for the disabled.
The Network provides access to the PNG community for
the disabled, and a platform for them to write and read
about the challenges they and their friends have faced
and conquered.
Thanks to Nienke, this unique achievement has a
reasonable chance of survival after she has left PNG.
The Network has attracted the attention of Health
Minister Sir Peter Barter, who has promised support, and
the practical backing of Divine Word University president
Fr Jan Czuba.
And the disabled themselves will fight to keep The
Network alive.
Slowly and painfully, they are carving a place for
themselves in our society. We can all help quicken that
process.
This week, the British High Commission gave 50
wheelchairs to Nonga Base Hospital.
There are skills we can pass on, skills that may
unlock a new future for many.
Some of us can provide work for the disabled, whose
demonstrated abilities often startle employers.
In the field of sport, dedicated professionals
continue to give patience and time to training disabled
athletes.
In a land where the handout mentality is often rightly
criticised, the disabled can and do hold their heads
high.
They want no soft soap, no cocoons of sympathy.
Many simply want to melt into the community as
ordinary citizens. They can do this with ease, if we
abled bodied cease to view them as curiosities and
subjects of amusement.
On World Disabled Day this year, we saw a young man
displaying a placard to the able-bodied public.
It pleaded neither for charity nor understanding.
It read: "Your ignorance is my disability."
Source
www.thenational.com
