BY INDY MAEALASIA
THE People with Disability Solomon Islands (PWDSI) has expressed eagerness and hope that the new government to come into power will pass the Mental Health Bill.
PWDSI CEO, Caper Fa’asala made this comment during the country’s first ever Psycho-social workshop on Tuesday.
“We want to emphasise the need to quickly look at the Mental health bill. As you might have known, we had helped the government in reviewing the disability policy and that we had even paid for consultants to do that to support the government,” Mr Fa’asala said.
Advocating for more inclusions, recognition and the removal of stigmas that surrounds disabilities, Fa’asala assured the Ministry of Health and Medical Services (MHMS) that the organisation is willing to commit in any way with MHMS to ensure the bill will be passed in parliament soon.
Fa’asala also hoped that in partnership with the MHMS and other stakeholders they will collaboratively push for social benefit policy to alleviate the wellbeing of people with disabilities and old-age citizens.
Meanwhile, with elections just over a month away and political parties campaigning in full force, promising to bring changes in various sectors including health, Fa’asala is concerned with how the new government will prioritise citizens living with disabilities.
“I see and hear that most of them had made broad statement but they had not explained how will that statement be implemented,” he said.
Fa’asala added that though they have manifestos and policies if their candidates successfully secure seats, they might not prioritize mental health.
“That is what I am worried about, we want to encourage parties to be more inclusive not only in their policy statement but in their executive as well,” he said.
Fa’asala hoped that political parties in the future would have more members with disabilities to ensure their concerns are heard at the highest level of government.
“They need to have people with disabilities in their executive so that when they form the coalition surely, under the coalition they would seat in the advisory level to advise government on matters concerning people with disabilities,” he added.
