The Executive Secretary, National Commission for Persons With Disabilities (NCPWD), Dr. James Lalu, has reiterated the commission’s commitment to securing financially inclusive opportunities for persons with disabilities in Nigeria.
Lalu made this known while speaking to journalists at a Sightsavers Nigeria project launch held at Access Corporation’s headquarters in Lagos.
Lalu, who was a special guest at the event, had the honor of formally launching SABI-Woman – a project designed to impact no less than 2800 women and girls with disabilities in areas of career mentorship, job creation and financial inclusion.
The Executive secretary, visibly excited by the initiative, was full of commendation for Sightsavers and assured of NCPWD’s full support by influencing key players in the country’s financial sector, namely the Bank Of Industry (BOI) and Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Lalu shared that “the Bank of Industry has remained committed to providing loan opportunities for the disability community from N1m to N10m. We are working right now with the BOI to reduce some of its conditions around it to be able to stimulate persons with disabilities to be active and go receive this type of loan”.
The disability community, according to Lalu, has demonstrated capacity, ability, and commitment to utilize opportunities they come across.
“A lot of people with disabilities are practically into business,” Lalu noted, “We have one person with disability who owns a rice mill in Kano. The commission has personally taken the responsibility to market businesses to persons with disabilities.”
Commenting on the 2024 budget, Lalu revealed that the sum of 100 million allocated will go into improving access for persons with disabilities in the business environment.
“This year, we are committed to providing 1500 POS machines for various disability communities across the country. We will be providing agricultural machinery to persons with disabilities across the country. A lot of our people are into farming. Some of them lack the necessary tools. We’ll support them in farming activities”, he said.
Taking the commission’s commitment to PWD causes, the Executive Secretary revealed that the NCPWD has secured a foreign direct investor, with work ongoing for the establishment of a factory for the production of standardized devices for persons with disabilities.
“I’m happy to announce that the United Nations Office for Project Services has also granted Nigeria $5m in grants to support our activities in the area of access to assistive technology for persons with disabilities. We look forward to providing opportunities for the disability community in Nigeria”, he concluded.