The Coalition of Unemployed Graduates with Disabilities has defended its decision to decline handing over its petition to Presidential Staffer Dr Samuel Ayeh, insisting that he was not the appropriate official to receive the document.
According to the Coalition, it wanted a senior government official with the authority to take decisive action on its concerns to receive the petition.
Speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen, Convener of the Coalition, Gilbert Boateng Agyare, said the group had submitted several petitions to government in the past without seeing meaningful action.
“Dr. Sammy Ayeh did not qualify to receive the petition from our demonstration by persons with physical disabilities at Jubilee House. However, we are happy that Nana Yaa Jantuah later came to receive it,” he said.
Mr Agyare said the Coalition was therefore seeking to engage officials higher in the government hierarchy, including the Chief of Staff, the Vice President or President John Dramani Mahama.
“We want to meet somebody more within the top hierarchy of government than Dr Samuel Ayeh. No disrespect to Dr Ayeh. We want to go beyond Dr Ayeh because when we came here the first time, and Madam Shamima Muslim came, we thought that our issues were going to be resolved, but at the end of the day we realised the issues were above her, and she couldn’t do anything,” he said.
He added that the Coalition’s immediate objective was to ensure that its concerns were presented directly to an official capable of making decisions on the matter.
“So on this day our mission is to meet the Chief of Staff, the Vice President or the President,” he said.
The Coalition of Unemployed Graduates with Disabilities on Wednesday, August 19, declined to present its petition to Dr Ayeh, who had been sent to receive the document on behalf of the Presidency.
Dr Ayeh, however, said he respected the group’s decision, stressing that he was acting on behalf of the President.
“I am also a senior member of government at the Office of the President, and I am standing in stead of the President. If the President has sent me to collect a petition on his behalf and in your opinion I am a nobody and so you will not give me your petition, well, I respect that decision. There is no problem,” he said.
He said the Coalition was free to wait until it met the official it considered appropriate to receive its petition.
The group had intended to picket at Jubilee House but was denied entry into the premises and its immediate environs. It subsequently relocated to Christ the King Church, where it continued its protest.
The Coalition has, since January, been calling on the government to implement the five per cent employment quota for persons with disabilities in the public sector.
It has accused the government of failing to fulfil the commitment, despite repeated assurances.
The Coalition cited the recent Ghana Education Service (GES) recruitment exercise as evidence, claiming that it submitted a verified list of 200 qualified graduates with disabilities for consideration, but none of them was recruited.
The group has therefore renewed its call for concrete action to address unemployment among graduates with disabilities and ensure the implementation of the five per cent employment quota.
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