By Jean Christou
THE CYPRUS Paraplegic Organisation (CPO) said yesterday it would suspend planned protests to give the new government a chance to fulfill its long-standing demands to improve the lives of disabled people.
Last week, the CPO threatened a series of protests, including challenging deputies to spend eight hours in a wheelchair, but after a meeting yesterday with House President Demetris Christofias, the organisation said it would suspend the planned measures for now.
Speaking after the meeting, Christofias admitted the government had been slow to look out for the rights of the disabled, but promised that from now on he would personally maintain regular contact with CPO president Andros Prokopiou to keep up with the needs of the island’s 5,000 or so disabled persons and the 25,000 with other special needs. Many of their problems have been outstanding since the ’eighties.
“The parliament is not only the legislative body but also the control mechanism for government,” Christofias said, expressing the conviction that this government would show the “necessary sensitivity” to the problems faced by the disabled. “These people face a lot of problems,” he added, pledging that President Tassos Papadopoulos would deal with the issues shortly.
Prokopiou said disabled people had continually been let down by the indifference of successive governments, particularly in the areas of employment and mobility, but said the CPO would give this administration a little time to come through on their demands.
“We are pleased that the President has demonstrated a personal interest and we hope that at least in 2003, the European Year of Individuals with Disabilities, that many of these problems will be solved,” he said.
In 2000 the then government laid out provisions, passed by parliament, to improve the lives of the disabled, which were to have been put in place by March this year bur according to the CPO nothing has been done.
According to figures released to the House Labour Committee last year, 75 per cent of handicapped adults are unemployed but willing to work. Deputies pointed the finger at the Finance Ministry for failing to release the cash needed.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
