Executive Secretary, National Commission for Persons with Disability, James Lalu, has said the Commission will set up a task force to ensure compliance with the January deadline for all public buildings to be accessible for persons with disabilities. He stated this at a World Press Conference in commemoration of the International Day for Persons with Disabilities in Abuja.
 
The executive secretary said the five-year grace period given to all public buildings to provide ramps, elevators, accessible bathrooms or conveniences, braille on signs, sign language interpreters as well as parking spaces close to office entrance, barriers free walkway, among others, will expire in January 2024.

“When you look at the Act, the Commission has been vested with the full responsibility of the enforcement of Act and it was stated in the law. Five years was given and the five years are rounding up so we are now transiting from the era of advocacy to en era of enforcement.
 
“By January, the Commission is expected to move out in full force to make sure the provisions of the law are properly enforced. The Commission will start meeting with its partners to compose a task force immediately and everything should be in place before by the end of this year so that the task force can be inaugurated early 2024.
 
“January 16, 2024 will be the expiration date of the grace period. So by midnight, January 17, the Commission’s task force will move out in full force and will visit key offices to start the physical assessment of these offices, including the constitution of staff of the institution. We want to know how many staff they have as persons with disabilities, the total number of staff in the institution and if they make up to five per cent. All these will help us to know if they are complying with the provisions of the law,” he said.

Lalu said the Commission is empowered to issue two certificates, pointing out the first has to do with accessibility compliance certificate, which is expected to be valid for five years after which there will be a reassessment to certify if these facilities are truly functioning.

“The second certificate is the disability compliance certificate. This looks at the overall compliance of the institution to the provisions of the Discrimination against Persons with Disability Act. If you comply with the disability, you will comply with the employment, environment, the settings, the capacity building needs and we will review all these before we issue the certificate.”

Earlier, minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr Betta Edu, said the enactment of the Disability Act has placed Nigeria on the global map of comity of nations as a country that has fulfilled the obligation required for the domestication of the United Nations’ Convention on Rights of Persons with Disability to which Nigeria is already a signatory.