By Peter Ochieng
120 Persons Living with Disabilities (PWDs) across Bungoma County have a reason to smile, after receiving a donation of wheelchairs from the county government in partnership with Walkabout Foundation.
The wheelchairs are fitted with modern features to ease movement, as beneficiaries go about their daily activities.
Speaking during the flagging off ceremony of the second phase of wheelchair distribution at the County Square, governor Ken Lusaka expressed gratitude to the Walkbout Foundation for the steadfast commitment and collaboration, in uplifting PWDs.
“As we walk the talk on empowering the PWDs, I want to acknowledge the immense cooperation by our esteemed partners, the Walkabout Foundation,” he said.
Lusaka, acknowledging the invaluable contribution by the PWD community to his legacy administration added, “Disability is not inability. Persons enabled differently have a significant impact on our county matters and should be embraced.”
Furthermore, the governor called on the County Assembly to expedite the formulation of policies and regulations governing the Disability Fund.
Under the same breadth, he cautioned beneficiaries against selling the wheelchairs.
Caro Mureithi, director, Walkabout Foundation said it was disheartening to learn that some of the previous beneficiaries had sold their wheelchairs at throw away prices.
“There are people whom we gave wheelchairs and now they don’t have, they sold them. If you are one of them and we meet in the streets of Bungoma, you will end up at Kamiti,” she warned.
She said the wheelchairs are normally purchased at between Sh50,000 to Sh80,000 only for some people to sale them at between Sh2,000 and Sh10,000.
In addition, Muteithi said it was wrong for PWDs to ‘make a living out of begging.’
“Being disabled does not mean that you are stupid. It does not mean that you can’t do anything reasonable to sustain your self.”
Some of the beneficiaries thanked the sponsors for the timely donation. The event was organized by the County Department of Special Programs.