Cebu PWDs to Duterte: Help stop employment discrimination

CEBU CITY, Philippines – “Break employment barriers for us, the disabled.”

This is the message of the disabled people’s organizations (DPOs) in Cebu to the country’s incoming president Rodrigo Duterte.

Mark Joseph Signe, 28, said in a recent interview that he applied for work in various hotel companies but was denied job placements by every single one.

He was never told the reason for not being hired, but he suspects that it was because of his disability.

“I would like to see the next administration push for companies, organizations and government programs to become more familiar with the Magna Carta Law that protects access for people with disabilities,” Signe said. 

Eric Lopez, head of the Information and Training Division of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (PDRRMO), said: “Right now, we are still on that objective of shifting their (communities’) paradigm on how they look at disability. These people do not need our pity but our support in order for them to become productive like us.”

Dara Miñoza, 38, has suffered from polio since she was two. The illness almost cost her the chance to get a college degree. Her parents deemed her incapable of coping with college work, but her older sister believed otherwise and sent her to school. 

“I fought for my education,” Miñoza said. However, even after she graduated with a degree in computer science, her parents still restricted her from looking for work.

Families tend to hide their members who have disabilities, said PDRRMO’s Lopez.

“The more pressing issue,” he said,”is first, at the local government level. We really have to reach to the purok (ward) level, where we have to convince the families not to hide those family members who have disabilities. They’re usually portrayed as the pitiful bunch in society. Media needs to see the call for the empowerment of these people, that they are as amazing as anybody can be.”

Protection

Lopez said that although there are existing laws which entitle PWDs to equal opportunity for employment, these laws are rarely enforced by the local government and followed by the private sectors. 

Section 5 of Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta of Disabled Persons states: “No person with disability shall be denied access to opportunities for suitable employment. A qualified employee with disability shall be subject to the same terms and conditions of employment and the same compensation, privileges, benefits, fringe benefits, incentives or allowance as a qualified able bodied person.”

RA 10524 – An Act Expanding the Positions Reserved for Persons with Disability – states that “at least one percent of all positions in all government agencies, offices or corporal ions shall be reserved for persons with disability.”

Lopez said that due to lack of access to education, “most PWDs don’t even know there are such laws for them.”

In a summit for PWDs organized by the PDRRMO in May, several participants admitted that they did not know about the law entitling them to fair employment opportunities until PDOs reached out to them in their communities.

There is a need for stronger law reinforcement and maybe even revision in the future, Lopez added.

Role models 

Ronnie Lim, a deaf-mute and DPO representative, said, “Access to education for people with disabilities has failed us, especially in provinces where there are no special education programs for them.”

As a result, PWDs cannot get the jobs they want, said Lim.

Lim pleaded with President-elect Duterte for help: “In order for us to see more successful disabled Filipinos, we need your help in supporting us starting with education and access.” – Rappler.com

Richale Cabauatan is a Rappler intern based in Cebu City