Zimpapers Logo

Masvingo Correspondent
Government has said it fully supports plans by the Masvingo-based Reformed Church University (RCU) to establish a disability centre here that will cater for all educational and research needs of people living with disabilities.

Presidential Special Advisor on Disability Issues Dr Joshua Malinga recently said the establishment of a university disability centre will go a long way in promoting the interests of the disabled.

Addressing a strategic planning meeting to prepare for the setting up of the centre at the university, Dr Malinga told stakeholders at the RCU campus said Government fully backed the initiative.

He said the RCU has become the first university under President Mnangagwa’s new Government to foster the spirit of inclusivity between the able-bodied and the disabled by initiating the setting up a national disability centre.

“The new Government has thrown its weight in support of the RCU educational niche of inclusivity,” said Dr Malinga. “As an advisor to the President on issues relating to disability, I feel very emotionally attached to the university’s project to establish a disability centre.

“The proposed centre should be a strong weapon in tackling all forms of “exclusion” of people with disabilities in the country.”

Dr Malinga said the proposed disability centre would act as a research hub that will come up with a national database detailing the type of infrastructure, learning equipment and treatment sensitive to people with disabilities.

“Society will obviously learn to treat people with disabilities and the able-bodied uniformly from the new centre,” he said. “No more stigmatisation of the handicapped will prevail in our nation.”

Dr Malinga was in Masvingo where he was visiting various institutions catering for people with disabilities, among them Mushandike High School, Henry Murray School, Margaret Hugo Primary and Secondary schools, the National Association of Disabled Persons in Zimbabwe, Ratidzo School of the Mentally Challenged, Mutendi Resource Centre and Jairos Jiri Centre.

RCU has since enlisted a number of moral and funding partners including Save the Children Zimbabwe, among others to assist in the establishment of the new disability centre at the Reformed Church in Zimbabwe-run institution of higher learning.

The institution’s vice chancellor Professor Obert Maravanyika told stakeholders at the strategic planning meeting that its niche of promoting inclusivity had put the university on the international map.

“We are developing accessories that will make life easy for everyone, including those with disabilities, In other words, we want to create an environment in which disability will be treated as something normal,” he said.