The progress of societies is determined by the rule of civil justice that upholds the rights of all its members at all levels. Unfortunately, what happened in Lebanon in 2016 during the municipal elections and the recent parliamentary elections was scandalous. The most striking thing for me was the exclusion and marginalization of disabled persons through participation in the elections by disregarding their constitutional right. This happened despite the promises made by the Ministry of the Interior following each election that the following elections would uphold the right of every person to vote in dignity. The most recent of which followed the municipal elections of 2016 when Minister of Interior Nohad Machnouk confirmed his ministry’s failure to ensure that disabled persons are able to cast their ballots in dignity and apologized for not being prepared to ensure their access due to lack of time. But we saw the same thing happen in the recent parliamentary elections, the only difference being that the Government and the Ministry of the Interior had just under a year to prepare the logistics.
A month has passed since the parliamentary elections. The media have gone quiet and people have stopped talking about all the organizational failures and the disappointment of disabled voters. The election ended with promises from the Minister of Interior and Prime Minister that things will be better next time. The scandal passed without any accountability. There were just promises of solutions for the next elections that remained suspended in the air.
So why has the State failed so many times to facilitate voting of disabled persons, the elderly and other individuals who have difficulties in accessing polling stations?
The responsibility for failure lies primarily with the Government as a whole and with the relevant ministries: Ministry of Social Affairs, Ministry of Education, and Ministry of the Interior and Municipalities.
Government institutions flounder at each election although the solutions are easy and sustainable and do not require all this floundering to secure a fundamental right guaranteed by the Constitution. Paragraph (c) of the Preamble to the Lebanese Constitution unambiguously stipulates that «equality in rights and duties among all citizens, without distinction or preference». This is the role of the Ministry of Social Affairs following the adoption of Law 220/2000 for the disabled, which contains detailed provisions to realize the safety, dignity and well-being of disabled persons in their society. The National Council for Disability Affairs (NCDA) was founded as the decision-making authority for the affairs of disabled persons, chaired by the Minister and members consisting of experts and elected representatives of disabled persons. However, implementation of the law has yet to be put into action and some of its clauses require amendments and clarifications. The real-life implementation of the benefits for disability card holders also revealed that disabled persons are subject to complex bureaucracy in government departments, which do not have the internationally required standards to achieve the independence and equality of disabled persons. Although the law grants the NCDA many powers, it remains, unfortunately, as in the case of the country, full of political tensions and its decisions unimplemented. The Ministry of Social Affairs also lacks a dedicated information center to respond to the questions of holders of the disability card granted by the Ministry and of other members of the community who are concerned with disability issues. Most disabled persons suffer when they benefit from the privileges granted to them and often do not know how to obtain these services. After the adoption of Law 220/2000, the Ministry of Education had to supervise and follow up on its application to ensure that all schools are accessible. After all, children with disabilities are entitled to attend public and private schools and not to be isolated in establishments away from the rest of society. Given that the Ministry of Interior and Municipalities oversees the electoral process, it should have, as soon as the municipal elections ended in 2016, and in line with the promises made by the Minister, take the initiative to form a team of specialists to offer practical solutions. They should have used modern and innovative techniques to devise solutions that preserve and protect the dignity of disabled persons and the elderly and facilitate voting for a category of over 50,000 persons without exposing them to the risks of being carried and avoiding the humiliation they have experienced in previous years.
So why has disability become a seasonal issue after all the momentum it enjoyed in the 1990s and early 2000s? Today, it is almost absent from the State’s agenda, negatively affecting the lives of roughly 20 percent of the population, including disabled persons, the elderly and families with small children in strollers. All of them face the same difficulties of lack of adequate infrastructure to facilitate their daily duties.
Despite the available evidence and testimonies of disabled persons about violations and risks faced during the voting process, as well as objections to the absence of logistical procedures to allow all individuals to cast their ballots independently and without the need for any assistance, no disability organization or disabled persons has to date tried to hold accountable the Government and ministries concerned for the violation of their rights or followed up on the implementation of their promises.
I admit that I myself have been slack when it comes to this issue. This issue has not meant much to me despite the fact that I was diagnosed with poliomyelitis at the age of one. I worked for over two years at the NCDI, and then for five years at the Arab Resource Collective. Being a graphic designer, I decided to leave my work for NGOs and pursue my dreams and ambitions of working for a private company to realize myself. I moved between different companies in Beirut, Khobar and Doha, and finally settled in Beirut. What brought me back to this issue was a picture of a minister’s car parked in a place reserved for people with special needs. Later, I documented many of these violations and used social media to raise awareness, ask people for help and involve them in the process of documenting violations, mostly parking in places for people with special needs or buildings without ramps. Social media users interacted with me from all around Lebanon and have been sending me pictures of violations since 2007. What these pictures revealed is that majority of those who do not respect or enforce the laws are either ministers, MPs, doctors, security officers or chauffeurs waiting in the car. I have also documented in the pictures violations by representatives of diplomatic missions who also parked their cars in places reserved for people with special needs, ignoring the signs that prohibit parking there, even though these groups are supposed to have more awareness and better apply and respect the Law. When I ran in the 2016 municipal elections as part of the Beirut Madinaty campaign, my first goal was to shed light on this neglected cause and the focus of my campaign was «the right of access for all».
We are all slack regarding our cause. As organizations and as individuals. We, disabled persons, who work outside the scope of NGOs, have given up on our main cause. We fight on a personal level to ensure an accessible environment that enhances our own independence while ignoring the rest of our peers. This is no longer enough. We are all concerned. We must stand together to ensure enforcement of the laws and put an end to the violations of our rights, primarily by State institutions. Unemployment affects the majority of disabled persons, constituting the highest rates among the Lebanese population. Most disabled person do not have medical coverage, and the disability card is not recognized by medical institutions and covers individuals only when hospitalized. On the one hand, we get services, but, on the other, we are subjected to strict bureaucracy, and don’t get answers to many of our inquiries. These details may seem trivial to some but mean a lot to us. Small details that make our lives a hell of suffering.
It is high time for us to come together to formulate a comprehensive plan and move the issue of disability into the 21st century in accordance with our own criteria and conditions that impose solutions that suit us. We are not second-class citizens; we are productive, pay taxes and contribute to the national economy. We are not dependent on anyone. The State and the private sector can benefit from the skills that many disabled persons have to offer.