A RECENT encounter with three physically challenged but highly cerebral men brought to the fore, the need to design and build public buildings that are friendly for these individuals. The three men led by Mr.Cosmos Okoli (OON) were on a courtesy visit to the Kirikiri Canal, Apapa office of Vanguard Media Limited.

They could not climb the staircase to get to the offices. Indeed only one of them, Chuks was able to come up while the others were in the waiting room downstairs. Their first question was why the two-storey head office complex of Vanguard had no lift. "I give examples with wherever I go. Take Vanguard for instance. If my secretary who is on wheel chair were here with us, he would be carried to get to this place. Are you telling me that tomorrow you may not employ a brilliant young man who is on wheel chair who can do a lot as a staff, a reporter, subeditor or whatever? Why is this environment not so friendly?" Mr. Okoli asked.

Without waiting for a response he stated: "The reason is because there is no law; there is no legislation that says that public buildings must be accessible to persons with disability. That is what has been happening all over the world. In fact, Zimbabwe in 1992 enacted a legislation to protect the rights of persons with disability. I have decided not to talk about Europe and America because when you talk about them, people will tell you, 'Ah! those people are developed countries'. I am now talking about African countries. South Africa has gone beyond making laws and enacting legislations to making sure that government businesses are equitably distributed." he said.

Asked what would be done to make public buildings accessible to physically challenged persons, Mr. Okoli who was visibly eager to provide the answer said: "First, to make a building accessible, you can put any kind of structure or architectural design you want. Why do you put steps in a building that has elevated platform? So that every body can use the steps and get there. The same way, after putting steps for everybody, you put a ramp on the corner for those on wheel chair so that they too can access the building without being assisted. If you have a lift in a building and you have numbers there, those numbers should also have brail prints on the side so that a visually impaired person can get into the lift, check the floor he wants to go and go wherever he wants to go without calling: please who is there, come and help me".

Continuing, Mr. Okoli said drainage channels should be covered because it poses danger to the visually impaired people. "At least from the cities where there is high traffic, let us begin to cover our drainages. The open drainage is not helping anybody. That is why people instead of taking their refuse to refuse dumps, they prefer to drop them into the open drainage. So, we want architectural designs, buildings to be accessible to persons with disability".

Stop approving plans that fail to consider the disabled

The ASCEND President charged the government to stop approving building plans whose designs failed to take physically challenged persons into consideration. "In each building, there must be at least one toilet that is accessible to someone on wheel chair. There are facilities you put there. It is not expensive particularly when you incorporate it from the beginning.

No building plan should be approved without conforming to international standards for access to public buildings. It is internationally recognised. Disability issues have been recognized by the United Nations as human rights issues. Nigeria has been signing conventions of the United Nations over the years on the rights of persons with disability but it has not domesticated even one of those conventions because the UN convention is an international law that cannot be enforced in any country unless that country domesticates it. By the time we have a legislation that stipulates the standards, the dos and don'ts and the penalties, our people will begin to conform.

Kick against the BRT scheme

Mr. Okoli faulted the design of the BRT scheme embarked upon by the Lagos Metropolitan Transport Authority(LAMATA) and urged the government to incorporate facilities that will make the scheme accessible to the physically challenged.

"We have just visited LAMATA that is developing the new transport system. This new initiative is not accessible to persons with disability. The buses in use totally exclude persons with disability. We visited them and told them that before they launch that transport system, they should correct that terrible mistake and funny enough, this project is sponsored by the World Bank and the World Bank shouldn't get involved in projects that 'discriminate' against people," he said.

The group, according to Mr. Okoli wants to meet with the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), the architects and the authorities that approve building plans. "We are pushing legislations. We already have a draft bill which some of our friends in the Senate and House of Representatives are eagerly waiting to push in the National Assembly and by the time we get that legislation, it will become illegal for any public structure to be inaccessible to persons with disability.

Once we get that bill, a lot of things will fall into place quickly because by the time you are sued and you pay damages, you will quickly make your buildings compliant. While we await that legislation, we are going on advocacy visits, enlightenment campaigns to educate and prepare people about what is coming". He warned that the country's development goals may not be realised if the disabled are unfairly treated. "If we do not carry along persons with disability which make up over 19 million of the population, our Vision 2020, attainment of Millennium Development Goal (MDG) and New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) will be a mirage".

Architects, Estate surveyors back them

Aligning with the views canvassed by Mr. Okoli, a Lagos-based Architect, Mr. Emeka Izuwah lamented that most public buildings and transport system in the country are not friendly to those who are physically challenged.

Mr. Izuwah who is the Principal Partner of Archiplex Consult explained that ideally, all public buildings should have ramps on the ground floor to make it easy for the disabled to have access to such buildings. He opined that ramps should equally be installed in residential buildings so that disabled persons on wheel chair can gain entry into such buildings.

Besides making provision for ramps, Arc. Izuwah called on developers to provide grip bars to assist those who are not physically stable to climb the staircases. Noting that some disabled persons may not be able to use the toilets that their able bodied counterparts use, the Archiplex boss muted that it should be mandatory (in the Building Code) for all public buildings to take the disabled into consideration. On public transportation, Mr. Izuwah stated that abroad, most commercial vehicles have platforms that will enable the physically challenged to board them while some seats are specially reserved at the back for them. Recalling the plight of celebrated novelist, Prof. Chinua Achebe on a recent visit to the country, Arc Izuwah said it was pathetic at the airport.