Ref: 07/2007

Date: 27 February  2007

PCHR & UNSCO Organize a National Conference for the Rights of the Disabled Entitled “Towards Developing the Rights of Disabled Palestinians”

On Monday, 26 February 2007, PCHR and the United Nations Special Coordinator’s Office organized a national conference on the rights of the disabled in Gaza City under the title of “Towards Developing the Rights of the Disabled Palestinians.” The conference was organized to compare the International Convention on the Rights of the Disabled, to be ratified in March 2007, with the Law of the Disabled and its executive procedures. Academics, activists in the field of disability rights, government officials, and civil society activists attended the conference.

Raji Sourani, opened the conference by stressing the importance of the topic as an integral component of the economic, social and cultural rights that concern the majority of people. In addition, he pointed to the fact that the issue of the rights of the disabled has become a national issue that has received considerable effort and attention. He also stressed that the conference aims to support the previous work conducted by other organizations in the field.

Saber El-Neirab, the director of UNSCO, talked about the importance of comparison between the International Convention on the Rights of the Disabled with the relevant Palestinian law, so as to develop the law in line with the Convention that is to be ratified next month.

The first session in the conference was entitled “Rights of the Disabled: Human Rights. The first speaker was Dr. Tariq Mukheimar from UNSCO, who talked about the International Convention on the Rights of the Disabled and its legal obligation on its signatories.

Khalil Shahin, director of PCHR’s Economic and Social Rights Unit, talked about the Palestinian Law of the Disabled. He pointed that the law was passed in 1999, and gave the disabled a number of rights. He also stated that the laws executive procedures were passed five years after the law. Shahin stressed the fact that the law constituted an important development; but that the procedures contain many gaps that need to be filled.

The third speaker in the first session was Walid Bahjat, director of rehabilitation at the Ministry of Social Affairs. He talked about the role of the ministry in rehabilitating the disabled. He also pointed that more than 200 disabled persons are employed by the Ministry, which constitutes more than the legal minimum of 5% of staff set in legislation. He also pointed to other achievements of the ministry including the verification of the procedures of the law of the disabled, establishing new rehabilitation centers, and launching a loans program of interest-free loans for small project for the disabled.

The second session started by a presentation for Dr. Bassam Abu Hashish from Al-Aqsa University in Gaza City. He talked about disability and its various forms and degrees. Furthermore, Abu Hashish criticized the accuracy and objectivity of previous studies on the disability in Palestine, stating that the results of the most recent scans were in 1992 in Beach and Bureij refugee camps. These scans indicated that the disability rate was 4%.

Nahed Eid from Future Palestine Association for the disabled talked about the role of NGO’s in protecting the rights of the disabled. He pointed to the lack of a national development plan adopted by all parties involved in the field. He also criticized the weakness of coordination between NGO’s and GO’s, and stressed that the work of NGO’s suffers from weaknesses. Eid pointed to the importance of finding sources of funding to assist the disabled.

Hatem Hamdan, the director of the Nour Centre for the disabled, talked about “Developing Monitoring Mechanisms to Enforce the Rights of the Disabled.” He demanded that relevant parties should install punitive measures in legislation against those who violate the law of the disabled. In addition, he stressed that the current law of the disabled is void of any guarantees of its enforcement. Hamdan reiterated the need for an independent monitoring body to oversee the enforcement of the law of the disabled.

The conference came out with a number of recommendations:

-         Organizing a workshop on the International Convention on the Rights of the Disabled as soon as it is ratified in order to compare it with the Palestinian law of the disabled.

-         Studying conflicting efforts by official bodies in attempting to enforce the law of the disabled.

-         Developing a permanent monitoring body to oversee the implementation of the law.

-         Designing an implementation mechanism that includes all aspects of the law of the disabled.

-         Increasing public awareness about rights of the disabled.

-         Creating a lobby to further the rights of the disabled.

-         Removing conflicting legal texts relevant to the employment of the disabled.

An open discussion followed the two conference sessions.