The Rivers State Chapter
of the South South Physically Challenged Indigenes (SSPCI) has condemned what it describes as “deliberate marginalization and exclusion of a mass population of physically challenged voters” by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) during the ongoing voter’s registration exercise in Rivers State.
The group expressed its concern in a press statement signed by the Executive Chairman, Altraide Ikekena, and Rivers State Cordinator, Mr. Fabian Obodo, and made available to The Tide.
The group blamed INEC and other stakeholders for the difficulties encountered by physically challenged persons in course of participating in the voter’s registration exercise, as a result of non provision of the enabling environment for people living with disabilities.
The body faulted the fact that no registration centre was designated by INEC to attend to the physically challenged persons, to avert the difficulties of waiting for long hours at the centres.
According to the statement, out of the forty-five thousand eligible physically challenged voters in Rivers State, only fifteen thousand of them have been able to participate in the National exercise.
The group also described the exclusion as an attempt to disenfranchise a mass population of  the electorates with special needs, thereby denying them the opportunity to vote for candidates whose policies would facilitate the advancement of the course of the physically challenged community.
To accommodate more eligible physically challenged persons in the exercise, the group urged INEC to extend the voters registration by one week.
It also called on the Government, National Human Rights Commission, civil society groups and well meaning individuals to sponsor programmes geared towards mass education and development of the physically challenged in the society.

Taneh Beemene