The Parliamentary Committee on National guidance and gender matters has called on the government to incorporate sign language (SL) in the educational curriculum to ease communication between the hearing impaired and members of society.
The committee chairperson Harry Kamboni said the committee has observed that the deaf in the country has continued to face challenges in participating and having access to socio-economic activities owing to communication barriers.
Mr Kamboni who is a Kalomo Member of Parliament (MP) said the introduction of SL at all levels of education will address the issues such as exclusion and marginalization of the deaf in communities.
“After undertaking a study with members of the committee we have observed that the deaf has continued to face challenges in workplaces, business and social environments.
The absence of sign language interpreters or other hearing-assisted services undermines the ability of the deaf to access services such as medical attention and fully participate in the social economy of the country.
Take interest in mounted road signposts, in any parts of the country, they are all in sign language such that even if one is in a foreign country, they are able to understand.
We have come to the conclusion that sign language is a universal language,” he emphasized.
Mr Kamboni also stressed the need for public buildings to be accessible to persons with disability, mainly to wheelchair users.
He stressed that with government implementing free education policy and running inclusive education where able bodied and disabled are learning in the same environment, school administrators need to ensure that school infrastructure is accessible.
Mr Kamboni said this when he led a delegation of committee members to pay a courtesy visit to the office of the Copperbelt province Permanent Secretary Augustine Kasongo.
Meanwhile, Mr. Kasongo affirmed the observation of the committee, stressing that lack of access to buildings was also present at worshipping Centres.
Mr.Kasongo said his office will ensure that buildings are inspected and are made accessible to persons with disability.
However, he has appealed to the committee members to put in a voice to have the policy which looks into infrastructure housing skills training for persons with disability.
He stressed that Ndola Kang’onga centre for the blind has run down due to dilapidated infrastructure and the development has derailed activities to have persons with disability attain a skill for their survival.
He said the situation is defeating the new dawn’s government’s vision to have a skilled population to drive the economic growth of the country.
The committee is on a two days tour of the Copperbelt visiting institutions that look into the welfare of persons with disability.
Let’s be serious …other countries are advocating for IT skills like coding at an early age you are busy wasting time in National Assembly. To this day I still dont know why I was forced to study European History about Hitler and Churchill, even RE and French.
These additional to our curriculum need to be an option and not mandatory, take for instance local languages.
What parleys need to do is advocate for an entire new curriculum. Wipe out this old curriculum full of none essential topics.
Such a call requires expert advice because the experience of those that handle children with special needs is that those with partial hearing impairment but are able to speak glide back when they mingle with the completely deaf and dumb. My view on education is that we should concentrate our efforts on skills training such that when children leave school at whatever level they’d have obtained some skills. We don’t need to be training bricklayers, carpenters, mechanics, plumbers, etc in colleges. Every year we offload around 400,000 school levers without any skill. That’s an alarming statistic. Language isn’t a problem, haven’t you seen how proud Lozis have mastered Bemba begging skills? Tulelombako uwafwilisho is now in their mouth right in Lusaka.
Last year over 460,000 grade 7 pupils proceeded to grade 8, however, only 120,000 made it to grade 10. That means over 360,000 dropped out. Zambia’s combined tertiary space at 1st year is just about 20,000, this means that of all school levers at grade 12 only 20,000 will enter into college or university while the rest will end up in mobile money booths. This is what should worry our Parliamentarians and not the useless crap that they have raised. In 5 years of Bally’s reign we’ll add another 2M unemployed youths without any skill. This is a national crisis that calls for an urgent change of the school curriculum. What TEVETA is doing in schools is nothing compared to these statistics. Don’t waste time and resources trying to fix Bowman or ECL and his cohorts. Zambians won’t judge…
Zambians won’t judge by how PF members you arrest. Let’s tackle this challenge and we’re willing to help. You have an opportunity to build your legacy but it’s up to you to seize it