By Bakah Derick
19 persons with disabilities have reportedly registered as new voters in the North West Region. This information is contained in a comparative analysis of 2021 and 2022 registration statistics published by the North West Regional Delegation of Elections Cameroon (ELECAM) on Wednesday 31 August 2022 being the end of new voter registration for the year.
With over 300 000 persons living with disabilities in the restive region, the Regional Delegate of ELECAM Zofoa Njoya Sake who refused to speak on record has told www.hilltopvoices.com that the low registration was due to the fact that many of them do not have the prerequisite document which is the National Identity Card despite sensitisation and contacts of their focal points.
The Coordinator of the Coordinating Unit of Association of Persons with disabilities (CUAPWD), Chick Sama has denied the claim blaming the elections management body for not being intentional about involving persons with disabilities in the voter registration process. His analysis insinuates that, disability inclusion in the Cameroon voter registration process still falls short of actionable steps taken by ELECAM to protect the political rights of persons with disabilities.
“It is true that lots of persons with disabilities don’t have ID cards. It is very true but it cannot be up to 10percent of the figure.” Sama argued explaining that if the region had only about 300 000 persons with disabilities and 100 000 could be of voting age, to say that not even 5000 have ID cards could not be true. “To say that persons with disabilities do not have ID cards could be true in the sense that because of the crisis some of them got burnt in the houses, others lost it and things like that just like any other person is facing in the crisis.” He added
According to the published statistics, 11 of the 19 persons with disabilities registered are men and eight women all in Mezam division.
Hilltopvoices sources have revealed that majority of the 19 persons with disabilities if not all were registered in a single event in Bamenda III subdivision a few days to the closure of the voter’s register.
Our source further indicated that about five days to the end of registration, no person with disability had been registered anywhere in the region.
“It is not right a nice thing to know that only 19 persons with disabilities are part of this statistics but to say that on the part of the authorities that is ELECAM, they need to do more in order to target persons with disabilities. There are a series of challenges that persons with disabilities go through that may not permit them to be registered not because they don’t want to but because the services may not be very accessible to them and so ELECAM needs to do conscious efforts to see that persons with disabilities are part of the registration process…. This is not good statistics for a region like North West or a division like Mezam where disability advocacy is at its peak.” Sama noted
The CUAPWD lead is proposing that to bypass the ID Card challenge, the National Disability Card could be adopted since it contains basic information like name, ID Card number, dates of issue and expiry which is what ELECAM wants and should be accepted for registration when presented because it is a valid document in Cameroon.
With close to 100 people now registered with disabilities as a result of the ongoing armed conflict, the CUAPWD administrator himself living with visual disability encourages the elections management body to consider the economic needs of persons with disabilities as a challenge to obtain the ID card. With the powers given them, Chick Sama believes that ELECAM could propose projects event to the government or other humanitarian organisations “to produce ID cards for persons with disabilities free of charge.”
According to sources at the Socio Economic Empowerment of Person with Disabilities program of the Cameroon Baptist Convention Health Service, statistics indicate that 15percent of the world’s population is made up of persons with disabilities so too is the North West with the possibility to increase following the ongoing armed conflict.
With close to 11000 newly registered voters following the published statistics, the coordinator of CUAPWD argues that not fewer than 10% of that number is supposed to be made up persons with disabilities if they were intentionally targeted.
#EndCovid237 #CmrfreeCovid19 @pevcameroon
By the same time in 2021, the North West regional branch for ELECAM reported 3564 registered voters. No details were given in relation to persons with disabilities at the time. Zofoa Njoya Sake justifies that the increase in 2022 is due to the relative calm in the restive region, logistic support received from ELECAM top administration, many evaluation meetings, staff commitment amongst others. The ELECAM regional head refused to disclose the strategy used in registering voters in all divisions of the region which have witnessed increases despite being tagged red zones in the ragging armed conflict.
With no person with disability registered out of Mezam, CUAPWD's coordinator insist that if there could be new voters without disabilities anywhere, it means there could also be those with disabilities. Sama Chick admits that the armed conflict could be part of the general problem which affects everyone including those without disabilities but there are specifics only to persons with disabilities. He identifies inaccessibility of registration offices, incomplete voter education campaigns, and lack of community support especially at a time when Persons with disabilities continue to be challenged by the barrier of social stigma discouraging them from registering.
“Now the issue is ELECAM keeps looking at persons with disabilities from the general public. We have cited issues like accessibility issues but there are other barriers that stop people with disability from registering. One is information… they can make an announcement in Church about registration at a given date and the person with disability didn’t come to church because the church is not accessible, the person will not get the information. The end product of election is about voting. ELECAM materials in voting are not accessible (ballot boxes, polling stations are not friendly to persons with disabilities.) If I register and I cannot vote, it makes no sense to me. The political environment out of the crisis in terms of political participation in partisan politics where person with disabilities are still reticent because of the fact that they don’t allow them to be part of those to be elected is another issue. By and large, Information, accessibility to ELECAM services, accessibility to information at political party level and the electoral system in its entirety in the country makes things really difficult for Persons with disabilities.” Chick Sama explained.
Speaking on the state broadcaster, the Director General of Elections Erik Essousse disclosed that 305 persons with disabilities were registered national wide in a total of over 328 000 new voters.
To improve the inclusiveness of the voter registration process, CUAPWD is proposing effective collaboration between the election management body ELECAM with organisations of persons with disabilities and other civil society organisations with competences on the subject which could lead to the institutionalisation of access for persons with disabilities throughout the electoral process.
The ELECAM North West new voter registration statistics puts Mezam top with 5850, Menchum 1356, Donga Mantung 932, Boyo 907, Momo 787, Bui 501 and Ngoketunjia least with 236 giving a total of 10569 with 9431 reported as youths.