Background Paper – Disability in Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe is becoming an increasingly impoverished country with one of the biggest gaps between the rich and the poor. We have an unemployment rate of around 95%.  In addition we have one of the highest AIDS infection rates in the world.  Invariably it is the poorer sectors of society who suffer most under such circumstances.    In addition to poverty and the threat of AIDS anyone with a disability is further disadvantaged and marginalised.

Disabled people in Zimbabwe have always been socially disadvantaged and even now many are not accepted into society but are kept hidden by their families. There is at last a strong group in Zimbabwe lobbying for the rights of the disabled but at present this is only looking at the rights of an adult.  The position for disabled children is even worse than for adults:-

• Up until a few years ago most severely disabled children were kept at home and were excluded even from normal family life.  More children are now being sent to school at an earlier age but still too many disabled children are kept at home until they are too big to handle and then sent to school when it is sometimes too late for effective treatment.  During the official Census of 1992 there were many cases of parents replying to the question of how many children they had with the answer - “I have 4 children and that disabled one”!
• A recent survey undertaken by Unicef on Knowledge, Attitudes, Beliefs and Child Care Practices in Zimbabwe failed to find any realistic figures on children with disabilities.  When challenged on this the consultants claimed that the disabled children had been hidden away from them.  Further information to come out of this study was that most school children interviewed maintained that disabled children should not be offered an education! (June 2001)
• By far too many disabled children come from one parent families.  Parents often blame each other for having a child with a disability, one parent will then abandon the family and step parents are reluctant to take on a disabled child.  This can cause much fighting and disruption in a family with the disabled child being at the centre of the trouble. 
• Disabled children in Zimbabwe suffer from the continual fear of being abandoned.  They unfortunately accept that they will not be fully participating members of the family and as AIDS takes its toll in a family and children are passed from one adult to another, they always have the question “What will happen to me”.  The cultural extended family care system that used to operate has fallen apart in the harsh economic times and to take on a disabled child is just too much for most families.  The stigma attached to some forms of disability also causes the extended family to flatly refuse to take in or accept the disabled child.
• Too frequently disabled children who have been taught skills at school go home for the holidays to find that their parents or guardians cannot accept their new found skills and independence.  Often they are still left sitting in a corner or lying on a secluded bed, considered to be a trial to the rest of the family instead of being encouraged to use their growing abilities
• Schools and tertiary education centres are reluctant to take in disabled children.  Students have been excluded from the local university simply because they were deaf.  Many prospective students have been unable to attend secretarial colleges because they are situated upstairs.
• Public transport is a problem and many children have to be pushed to school because the local minibus services are unwilling to take the time and trouble to load up a child in a wheelchair.  Children travelling on long distance buses have to be accompanied by a family member as there is no special care offered by these buses.  This means the added burden of double bus fares and then an extra charge for carrying a wheelchair.
• Most companies are unwilling to offer work experience to school leavers and certainly do not give them permanent employment.  There is no policy for companies employing a certain number of disabled employees, although there are tax advantages for companies that are willing.
• Most buildings are inaccessible to children in wheelchairs or on crutches.  Just for an example a group of disabled students were recently invited to put on a play about AIDS at the Bulawayo City Hall.  Staff had to lift every single wheelchair up flights of steps to get the children on to the stage!  Yet at one stage in the past a long serving Mayor of Byo used a wheelchair.
• There is no special housing programme for people with disabilities, no payment of carers and no regular visits by social workers. 
• No allowances are made for those children who are hard of hearing.  Signing has only recently been permitted for exams.  There are no special exams for deaf students who struggle with the standard O level exams and are then excluded from tertiary education because they do not have enough O level passes.
• There is no understanding of hearing loss and nobody makes any effort to learn or use sign language.  Often a hearing impaired child is considered to be mentally retarded because of lack of language.
• Disabled children are excluded from most inter school events because of the problems of access, seating or simply an unwillingness to allow such children to participate with ‘normal children’!
• Disability comes with multiple expenses and in a recent study carried out informally it was found that a family caring adequately for a disabled child can expect to have added expenses as high as $300 per month! 
• In a wealthy country such problems would automatically come under the work of a social welfare department and social workers.  Unfortunately, the social services department in Zimbabwe is probably the most impoverished and demoralised of all government departments and is also severely under-staffed. Many disabled children come under this department because their parents simply cannot manage to pay school fees, transport and other basic needs.  In the past the ministry has paid out a pittance of per child per month!  Now they cannot even afford this.  Most disturbing of all is that the department is now unable to assist with the increasing number of serious social problems faced by disabled children. 

We still have a long way to go!