Persons with disabilities educated on their rights

Text and pictures by PRIYAN DE SILVA

The Disability Organisations’ Joint Front (DOJF) has been conducting a series of workshops throughout the country to educate persons with disabilities on their electoral rights with special focus on physical accessibility to polling stations, ability to vote, access to electoral information as well as the targeting of electoral information/voter education to meet the needs of marginalised communities.According to the recent census report 1.8 million people in Sri Lanka are living with disabilities and of this 1.2 million persons are eligible to vote.

The DOJF and its sub-cluster members also plan to address the above issues by identifying the major electoral issues that affect persons with disabilities and other marginalised communities in relation to the electoral process.The key stakeholders in relation to electoral reform in Sri Lanka are the Election Commission, the parliament, and political parties.Commissioner General of Elections Saman Sri Rathnayake, and Executive Director of the Institute for Democratic Reforms and Electoral Studies Manjula Gajanayake, were the resource persons at the workshops held in Colombo, Jaffna, Puttalam, Matara and Nuwara Eliya.